


My Love Is Like A Red, Red Rose

by peerieweirdo



Category: Carmilla (Web Series)
Genre: F/F, Its a Thing, THE TITLE IS SO CHEESY, Tattoo artist / florist au, i suck at titling, im so sorry
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-12
Updated: 2015-05-03
Packaged: 2018-03-07 05:35:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 15
Words: 25,838
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3163184
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/peerieweirdo/pseuds/peerieweirdo
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Two shops next to each other. One a florist, one a tattoo parlour.<br/>Two people. One a bubbly ball of sunshine, the other a punk with a bad attitude.<br/>Guess who runs which.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

Carmilla sighed, rearranging a bouquet of flowers with force that was probably unnecessary. 

“Woah, what did the hydrangeas ever do to you?” LaFontaine joked from the storeroom. 

“That incessant noise has been going on for three days now. And I live above this damn shop, so I can’t even go home to escape from it.” 

“It’s not that bad.” 

Just as LaFontaine said that, a particularly loud string of construction noises made Carmilla throw the flowers across the shop in frustration. Luckily the shop was empty of customers (as it often was) so the bouquet just lay on the floor, looking sad. 

“Dude, we gotta sell those!” LaFontaine walked over, picked up the flowers and placed them on the display to their right. Carmilla put her head in her hands. If the noise wasn’t bad enough, it had stopped her from sleeping, which was the perfect recipe for splitting headaches. And the work day had been slow, even for a derelict florists that usually only got one or two customers anyway. 

“How about you go home early? Try and catch up on that sleep?” LaFontaine offered.

“I doubt I’ll be able to sleep with that noise,” Carmilla said, but she smiled and picked up her bag anyway. “Thanks, LaF.”

“No problem,” the ginger waved at Carmilla as she walked out of the shop. 

It was literally five steps from the shop to her front door, but for some reason Camilla found herself curious to find out what _exactly_ was going on next door that warranted the endless bombardment of hammering and drilling. 

She walked over to the shop right next to hers. It used to be a cafe, but got shut down because of some sort of horse meat scandal, and it had been a vacant space for the past few years. Now, however, it seemed someone was using it again. 

The place was still unpainted, but she could peek inside the window and make out people walking around carrying planks of wood and chairs. Probably another cafe. 

When a particularly loud power tool caused a shot of pain to her temple, Carmilla straightened up and decided to give them a piece of her mind. They couldn’t just make that much noise twenty-four-seven and think they were gonna get away with it. 

She opened the door and stepped into the shop. The smell of varnish and paint assaulted her nostrils. Five burly men were lugging about chairs and playing awful country music much too loud, but the sound of the offensive drilling was nowhere to be seen. 

“Excuse me?” Carmilla asked. When no one took any notice of her, she raised her voice. “Excuse me?!” 

There was once again no reaction. Boiling with anger, she stormed over to the radio and pulled the plug out of the wall, causing a sudden silence that had her ears ringing. Unfortunately, the quiet was short lived as the construction noises started up again and seemed to be getting even louder. Everybody in the room turned to stare at her, annoyed. She put on a sickly sweet smile and tilted her head to the side.

“Now,” she began in a dangerously soft tone, “who here is going to tell me who’s making that god forsaken din, or am I going to have to kill everyone here, instead of just them?”

It would have been comical, the slim young girl threatening five large men, if she hadn’t been so utterly furious. One of them slowly pointed to a door at the back of the shop, and Carmilla nodded her head, walking over and pushing her way inside. 

“Can you please do everyone in this neighbourhood a favour and _shut the fuck-“_

Carmilla stopped in her tracks as a tiny girl squealed and fell off the chair she was standing on. 

“Oww,” she rubbed her head, which she must have banged off the floor. 

“Shit I’m sorry,” Carmilla rushed over to help her up. She certainly had not been expecting the source of her headaches to be a five foot two girl who looked like she collected beanie babies and probably cried at stray cats. She seemed to be in some sort of back room, but it was mostly empty save for some tools and one chair that had recently been vacated. 

“It was my fault, dad always warned me not to stand on chair because I’d fall. I just couldn’t reach the shelves…” as the girl gestured to the planks of wood and the drill in her hand, Carmilla remembered why she was there. 

“Oh, yeah. Uh, about that, you’ve kind of been making a lot of noise for like three days straight and I live just there,” she pointed vaguely in a direction that was sort of ‘up and to the left’, “and I can hear it all.”

The girl’s eyes widened. “Oh my gosh, I am _so_ sorry! I didn’t realise I was disturbing anyone!”

“It’s fine, honestly.” 

_Where did that come from? It certainly was_ not _fine and five minutes ago Carmilla had been ready to kill whoever was making the noise. Granted she’d been expecting some fat middle aged guy, not an adorable tiny girl, but still._

“It’s just, I’ve been trying to get this shop ready,” as she spoke the girl began walking around the room, busying herself with tidying up tools, “and we open in a week and I’ve barely gotten everything in here let alone set up, and not to mention I have to decorate once the basic infrastructure is there and…” she finally remembered to breathe, and turned to Carmilla with shining eyes. “I’m Laura.”

“Carmilla. And, I was overreacting I’m sorry. But can you just keep it down at nighttime?”

“Oh, yeah, sure! I really am sorry I didn’t realise I was keeping you awake-“

“Cupcake. Shut up.”

“Right,” Laura smiled. “Well anyway, uh, I guess I’m your new neighbour? I’ve got the apartment right above here.”

“You know I could help if you want.” At Laura’s raised eyebrow, she continued. “Setting up this place I mean.”

“Really? Thank you!” Laura bounced over to Carmilla and enveloped her in a crushing hug. Who knew such a tiny girl could be so strong?

“Relax, cupcake, I’m not just doing it for you,” Carmilla spluttered out through her crushed ribs, “If I help it’ll be over sooner and I can start getting some real sleep again.” 

“I really am sorry about that by the way,” Laura said, finally releasing Carmilla who took a few deep breaths. 

“So you’ve told me.” 

“How about I make it up to you? Do you like coffee?”

Carmilla smiled, surprised. “Are you asking me on a date, cutie?”

Laura blushed furiously. “No, no! Just a friend thing. Unless of course you don’t want to be friends and would rather we stayed as acquaintances in which case forget I even suggested anythi-“

“There’s a Starbucks down the street. Come on.” 

* * *

 

“So, what is the new place anyway? You gonna steal business away from me?” Carmilla joked over her coffee.

“Depends, what’s your business?” 

“A florist.” 

Laura spluttered hot chocolate everywhere, and then flushed red at the mess she’d made. She began to wipe it off the table, apologising as she did, and Carmilla just smiled at how adorable it all was. 

“I’m sorry I just… didn’t have you pegged as a florist.” 

“What did you have me pegged as?” Carmilla leaned across the table, and Laura blushed even deeper. 

“Uh, I dunno, some kind of badass who listens to punk rock and picks fights in bars?” 

“What makes you think I can’t do that _and_ whip up a mean bouquet of flowers?” Carmilla sipped her coffee teasingly. She decided she quite liked making this girl flustered. 

“Oh, no I didn’t mean to insinuate anything-“

“Relax, cutie, it was a joke. But you still didn’t answer my question. What’s your business?” 

“It’s, uh… a… tattoo parlour.”

It was Carmilla’s turn to choke on her drink, although she managed to not make a mess everywhere. 

“Bet you didn’t see _that_ one coming!” Laura grinned victoriously.

“I’m sorry but you’re being trusted with needles?”

“Yup.” 

“And permanent ink?” 

“Uhuh.” 

“Sweetie I’ve only known you for half an hour and so far you’ve managed to fall off a chair and spill hot chocolate everywhere, do you really think it’s a good idea to attempt to mark strangers bodies for all eternity without messing up?”

Laura furrowed her brow, and Carmilla realised that the only thing more entertaining than making her flustered was making her _angry._

“I’ll have you know that I’m actually very meticulous and I have a steady hand.” She stuck her nose in the air triumphantly. 

“Prove it,” Carmilla smirked, pulling a pen from her backpack and handing it to a confused Laura, before sticking out her arm. 

“Oh I see! What would you like?” 

“Anything.”

Laura grabbed her by the wrist and clicked the pen, before placing it on Carmilla’s arm. She could feel it on her skin, tickling slightly, but she refused to look at what was being drawn. Instead she focused on Laura, and the way her tongue stuck out slightly when she was concentrating and how her bangs fell over her face. She was very tempted to reach over and push them behind the other girl’s ear, but she stayed still, scared to ruin whatever was being drawn on her. 

Laura slowly turned Carmilla’s arm until it was facing upwards and the pen glided across more sensitive skin. Whatever it was, it was covering Carmilla’s entire arm. 

Eventually Laura finished, and she turned to smile at Carmilla, who tried to pretend that she hadn’t been looking at her this whole time. 

“Done!” 

Carmilla finally looked down at her arm and _holy shit._

Her entire forearm was covered in swirling lines reaching from her wrist to the crook of her elbow. They looked like ocean currents, or like Van Gogh’s Starry Night, circling each other and weaving all around the pale skin, and Carmilla couldn’t take her eyes off it. 

“And that was with a ballpoint. Imagine what I can do with colour… Carmilla?”

Reluctantly, Carmilla tore her eyes away from the (what could only be described as a) masterpiece on her arm, and met Laura’s expectant gaze. 

“Is it alright?” 

“It’s… beautiful.” Carmilla breathed. Laura hummed happily.

“I know. It’s kind of what I do.” 

And with that, Laura stood up and walked out of the coffee shop, leaving a thoroughly awestruck Carmilla in her wake. 

It was only hours later, when she was washing the ink off in her apartment, that Carmilla realised that right below the largest swirl, a phone number had been written in minuscule script. 

 


	2. Chapter 2

“So what’s this place gonna be called anyway?” Carmilla asked as she stood atop a chair, carefully hanging a painting on the wall. 

Laura was sitting on the floor, trying to sort out her inks by rainbow colour, but looked up at Carmilla to answer. She couldn’t help but notice the beautiful dark hair cascading down Carmilla’s back (mostly because she was facing the wall and therefore Laura couldn’t look at her face.) 

“Uh, ‘Colour Me Cute?’” 

“Okay, you’re cute.” Carmilla stepped off the chair much more gracefully than Laura could ever manage, and sat down next to her, folding her long legs underneath her. 

“No, that’s the name of the store!” Laura laughed, but it didn’t stop her heart skipping a beat. Carmilla called her cute. 

Wait, was that a compliment? Was cute a good thing amongst people who wore leather pants and red lipstick and rode motorcycles? Or was it like ‘oh that’s nice you look like twelve and I don’t have to listen to you because you’re cute’?

Did Carmilla even ride a motorcycle? 

“That doesn’t stop it being true. Although I’ll admit, this isn’t exactly what I pictured a tattoo place to look like.” 

Laura quickly scanned her eyes around the room. Three of the four walls were painted and they’d placed a large bookshelf on one end, with the cash register sitting on a small counter in front of the door to the back room, where the actual tattoos would be done. “What do you mean?” 

“Well, cutie, in my experience tat places have heavy metal posters not, uh, decorative foliage,” Carmilla smirked as she nodded towards a large house plant by the door. “Not that I’m not loving the Chinese evergreen, by the way.”

“Just because you’re some kind of punk who’s probably got like a zillion tattoos!” 

Carmilla looked over to Laura, and raised her bare arms in response. “Do you see any tattoos?” 

“Just because they’re not visible does’t mean there… aren’t…any…” Laura trailed off as she realised what she was implying, and felt herself blush in what could only be sheer humiliation. 

Thankfully, Carmilla just threw her head back and laughed. “Yeah, no. Completely blank.” 

“I could give you one if you want? You know, friend’s discount or whatever?”

“I’m not going to trust you anywhere near my skin with a needle.Even though you’ve proven that you can write phone numbers on arms, which was impressively smooth but also unnecessary. We live right next to each other, sweetheart.”

Laura hugged her legs and fidgeted with her bracelet. “Yeah I know, but I was drawing on your arm and the idea came to me. I know it’s kind of lame.” 

Carmilla shrugged, titling her head slightly. “Meh, it was cute.”

“You still haven’t called me. It’s been two days.” 

“I am literally sitting right in front of you.” 

“But still, I don’t have _your_ number. So if I needed to get hold of you in an emergency, I’d be in trouble.”

“And what kind of emergency, exactly, would cause you to require my help?” Carmilla asked, looking at Laura. 

“You never know. I could be held hostage and the ransom could ask for a bouquet of roses.” Laura replied.

“Well they’d be awful kidnappers if they allowed to you keep your phone,” Carmilla never missed a beat, “plus they’d have to be more specific on what type of roses they wanted.” 

“Oh really?” 

“Yeah I couldn’t just turn up with any old bouquet, I’d need to know the specifics!” 

“Of course.” 

“Well it’d be like someone walking up to you and asking for ‘something cool’. It’s way too vague!” 

Laura shrugged. “I could probably do it.” 

“What?” 

“Something cool.” 

Carmilla smiled wide, and Laura realised what was she was about to ask. 

“Ugh, _fine.”_

She sighed over-dramatically, and stood up to grab a pen from her bag, sitting back down in front of Carmilla. 

“Give me you arm,” she said, putting on an exasperated voice, despite not actually minding in the slightest. It gave her the opportunity to practice her patterns, plus she got to hold Carmilla’s hand which was kinda nice. 

Carmilla smiled and held out her arm. Laura grabbed her by the wrist and began to draw. Using a pen was, of course, very very different to using a needle. In fact it probably wasn’t very helpful in improving her skills at all. Still, the holding hands perk still stood. 

Laura pulled Carmilla’s arm right up to her face, focusing on the pale skin. She could smell the perfume on Carmilla’s wrists, which was lovely and not one Laura could name. Not that she was overly educated on perfumes. It somehow smelled like nighttime. Laura wasn’t even aware nighttime had a smell, but apparently it did and Carmilla had managed to bottle it. 

With a flourish, Laura stopped and released Carmilla’s wrist. 

“Voila!” 

She watched as Carmilla’s eyes widened and she let out a small breath, which Laura took as a good sign. 

“Uh, is it accurate? That’d be embarrassing if I got something wrong.” She gushed. 

“No, no you got it right.” Carmilla murmured. 

“Oh thank god! You know I don’t really know all that much about flowers but I did do biology in high school… granted I fainted whenever we talked about blood or organs or anything…” she could feel herself rambling but she couldn’t stop, “and I _did_ lead the campaign against frog dissection which was very important and _can you please say something it’s freaking me out.”_

Carmilla took her eyes off of the small flower on her wrist, almost as if she was surprised to see Laura sitting there. She fixed her with a wide gaze that was hard to decipher, still not saying anything. 

“So anyway we eventually _did_ manage to get rid of the frog dissection, but that still didn’t stop us having to look at pictures of their hearts so I ended up getting wheeled out of class in a wheelchair because I fainted and hit my head off the desk which hurt a lot and now I have a scar on my forehead but it’s really faint and I think Danny was the only person to ever notice it without me pointing it out and even then that was after we’d been dating for like two years…”

She trailed off, desperately hoping Carmilla would say something, but she was just staring at the floor, wringing her hands. 

“Are you okay? Carmilla?” Laura started to worry. Had she said something? Did she not like the drawing? Did her word-vomit scare her off? (It had been known to happen before. Laura really had to learn when to stop talking.) Scaring Carmilla was probably the worst thing that could ever happen. 

“Uh, yeah I’m fine. I better get back to my own job.” 

Carmilla stood up abruptly and all but ran out of the store. 

Laura sat cross legged in the middle of the floor with absolutely no clue what had just happened. 

 

 


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> i kind of warned you... carmilla's being a complete walnut and it was frustrating to even WRITE (also tw for some implied misgendering okay)

Carmilla stormed into the florists, slamming the door behind her with force that made the wind chimes hanging in the doorway rattle dangerously. 

“Woah, who peed in your coffee?” LaFontaine asked from behind the counter. 

“None of your business.” 

Carmilla walked over to one of the displays, rearranging a bouquet that was squint. 

LaFontaine must have picked something up, because after a while they asked, “you gonna tell me what’s up?”

“Nope,” came the reply through clenched teeth. 

“Do you wanna work in the back room today?” 

Carmilla stopped her violent assault of the flowers, leaning her head on the shelf and trying to ignore the painful aching in her chest.

“Yes,” she whispered quietly, lifting her head and walking into the storeroom, getting a comforting pat on the back from LaF as she passed. They had a sort of agreement called ‘when Carmilla’s in a bad mood she doesn’t have to deal with human contact and can spend the entire day sorting though stuff in the back room.’ This arrangement had been made after a particularly aggressive altercation with an old lady who ended up filing an official complaint (a fact that LaF would NEVER let Carmilla live down.)

There was something therapeutic about the monotony of unpacking the flowers, folding the cardboard boxes up and then taking them out to the trash outside once the pile got large enough. It was routine. It let Carmilla’s mind wander. 

And of course it wandered to Laura. 

Laura, with her adorable smile and her tendency to hug people she’d just met. Laura with the way she rambled when she was nervous. Laura with her beautiful art on Carmilla’s skin. Laura and the way she rambled when she was nervous. Laura and how Carmilla had been about to kiss her. 

 

Laura and Danny. 

 

Carmilla folded another box, chucking it on the pile and ignoring the stinging behind her eyes. She was not going to cry over a straight girl. She had too much dignity.

But it was just humiliating. She’d thought she had a shot, she thought Laura liked her, and the fact that she’d been wrong felt like a punch in the throat. 

What kind of a name was _Danny_ anyway? His parents must have hated him enough to call him Daniel, and then he must have hated _himself_ enough to shorten it.

Laura shouldn’t have to date anyone with that name. 

He could be an ex, but that still didn’t change anything. Not to mention the fact that Carmilla _totally_ noticed Laura’s scar before it was pointed out. 

So, ha. 

Who’s the better person now, Danny?

Carmilla sighed, putting down the box and running her hand through her hair. She was being childish. She knew she was. Resorting to petty insults because she was jealous. She was more mature than this. 

Still though, who the frilly hell did this ‘Danny’ think he was?!

* * *

“Hey, Carmilla, can you go pick up the delivery?” LaF asked hours later. Carmilla had already unboxed everything and was at this point sitting with her feet up reading a book. 

“You still don’t wanna see her?” Carmilla asked. 

“Nope.” 

“Alright then.” Carmilla slowly stood up, laying her book down on a shelf. She sort of understood LaF’s hesitation, but at the same time if she was annoyed with someone she’d come right out and tell them. 

Still, LaF had been asking her to get the deliveries for weeks now and if they let her work in the back room when she was feeling down, the least she could do is pick up a few flowers. 

“Is the truck here already?”

LaFontaine just nodded, then mumbled ‘thanks’ as Carmilla walked over to the door. 

“Hey, what are friends for?”

They smiled super wide at that. 

* * *

Perry was standing outside the truck, already starting to unload boxes, when Carmilla arrived. 

“I have everything here except the pear blossoms, but they should arrive any day now,” she said, handing over the first box to Carmilla, who put it into the trunk of her car. 

They worked in silence, until the last of the boxes were packed. As Carmilla slammed the trunk door down, she saw Perry look at her sadly.

“They didn’t want to see me?”

“Nope.” 

“I don’t blame them.” 

“Neither do I,” Carmilla crossed her arms. Perry was obviously looking for Carmilla to reassure her, to say that ‘everybody makes mistakes!’

But she wasn’t going to.

“I… I know I really hurt them but we’re best friends! Or we were at least.” 

“Really? Because the last time I checked best friends supported one another,” Carmilla replied cooly. 

Perry bit her lip and her forehead creased. 

“I made a mistake!”

“Look,” Carmilla could feel the rage building up inside her. “I get it, it’s difficult. Hell, even I still slip up sometimes and it’s been three years. But when I do, I fucking apologise.”

“I’m trying to-“

“Yeah? Too little too late, Duracell. LaFontaine may be too polite to actually tell you when you’re being an asshat, but I’m sure as hell not.” She started to get into her car, but turned back to Perry first. “And for the record, they asked me to come which proves they don’t wanna see you either. So back off.” 

And with that Carmilla got into her car, slammed the door, and drove away. She was actually quite proud of herself.

 


	4. Chapter 4

Okay, what the _heck_ just happened?!

Laura sat, dumbfounded in the middle of the floor where mere seconds ago her and Carmilla had been chatting normally. 

Why had she just run away? Had Laura said something? 

Maybe she got grossed out really easily, and Laura had made her uncomfortable by talking about frog dissection… or maybe she’d finally found Laura’s rambling annoying. 

Still, she’d lasted longer than most people. Laura had to give her that. 

She’d ask the next time she saw Carmilla what it was. Whenever that may be. Unless of course Carmilla never wanted to see her again, which was completely reasonable. Laura knew she was overwhelming and annoying and god knows she’d been told it enough times. 

Unsure what to do, she stood up off the floor and surveyed the room. They’d painted and decorated three of the walls cream, but she’d need to find more art to hang up to make it more interesting. 

The other wall remained a nice earthy green, but it was too dark for Laura’s liking. She could always make it the same color as the rest of them, but that was boring. 

She made a mental note to look at paint swatches in the next few days. 

She also needed a few more seats for the waiting area, but after that Laura dared to say they’d be ready. 

Of course, _then_ she’d have to actually employ people, and promote the business before opening. 

Another mental note: call the gazette and ask about ad space. 

The opening drum beat of ‘Shake It Off’ startled Laura, causing her to yelp. When she realised it was her phone ringing, she laughed at her ridiculousness. Briefly she wondered if it was Carmilla calling to explain everything, but when the screen flashed _Dad,_ her heart sank. 

Which was weird. 

Since when did she not want it to be her Dad calling? 

“Hey Dad,” she lifted the phone to her ear, smiling. 

“Hello sweetheart!” She could hear other voices on the other end, along with paper shuffling and people typing. 

“Are you calling me from work?”

“What can I say, I wanted to check up on you. And today’s been really slow.”

“Want me to murder someone to make it more exciting?” Laura joked. 

“Petty theft would suffice.” 

“Done. I just robbed a bank.” 

“Wow that was quick.” 

“What can I say I’m an efficient worker.”

“Speaking of which, how’s the DIY going? I’m assuming you haven’t accidentally stapled yourself to a wall or anything?” Laura could hear her father trying not to laugh. 

“Okay, first off that was _one time,”_ she said, “and second off, I’ve got help.” 

“Oh really? Did you finally patch things up with Danny?” 

Laura sighed, pinching the bridge of her nose. 

“No, Dad, I don’t think we’re going to make up this time.”

“But she’s such a nice girl, and you were both such good friends-“

_You have no idea how good ‘friends’ we were._

“Dad, please can you drop it?” 

“I just worry about you. Danny kept you safe-“

“I don’t need to be kept safe! I’m nineteen for god’s sake! I’m sure I can handle myself!” 

They were silent for a moment, with just the tinny noises of the office filtering through the phone. 

“…so who’s helping you?” her dad asked eventually. 

“Oh, uh, it’s the girl who works in the florists next to me.” 

“Is she nice?”

“I think so? I just don’t think she knows it yet.”

“…did you just quote _Annie_?”

“Maybe? I really liked that movie.” 

Her dad laughed, and Laura let out a breath of relief. She’d successfully moved the conversation away from her ex ‘best friend’ Danny. Ten points to Gryffindor. 

“Honey, I kind of assumed when you wouldn’t stop singing those damn songs.”

Laura felt herself flush red. She had a habit of singing a lot. “Yeah, sorry about that.” 

“Anyway, I gotta go sugarplum. Although I’m bored out of my nut with all this paperwork, I’ve got to actually do some of it.”

“Okay, talk to you later!” 

“Yeah, love you!”

“Love you too.” 

The phone beeped, signalling the end of the call. Laura sighed and put it back in her pocket. That was close. Her Dad had loved Danny, and it was really difficult to some up with a reason they were no longer talking. Other than, you know, the truth, which was _totally_ not an option. She’d briefly considered coming out during sophomore year, when she’d just begun dating Danny. But she chickened out and their relationship had been kept a secret. Which was partially why they’d broken up.

Partially. 

Still, someone as tall as Danny would definitely be helpful right now. 

There were only so many chairs a girl could fall off.

* * *

unknown number: Do you still need help?

ball of dork: omg yes please!!! but im actually done for tonight

unknown number: Oh, okay. I’ll come round tomorrow then. 

ball of dork: u can still come round to my place tonight, we just wont be doing work

unknown number: Be there in five. 

* * *

Laura was frantically rushing around, straightening furniture, when the doorbell rang. It was silly for her to be nervous. Her and Carmilla had spent time together before. But this was different. 

This was her _apartment._

She ran over to her door and opened it. Carmilla was standing on the landing, her hand shoved into her hoodie pockets, looking pretty uncomfortable. Laura felt her stomach drop. Maybe this was a bad idea. After what had happened earlier, why did she think Carmilla would want to see her? 

But when the other girl’s face broke into a small smile, all of her worried flew out of the window. Carmilla’s smile was so rare and beautiful and genuine that Laura decided she was going to try and make it happen as often as possible. 

“Hi!” 

“Hey.”

“Oh, uh, come in!” Laura opened the door further to allow Carmilla to walk past her into the hall. 

“So if we don’t have the joys of interior decoration to occupy us, what do you suggest we do?” Carmilla asked 

“Well the living room’s through there,” Laura gestured to her right, “we could watch a movie?” 

“Sure.” Carmilla walked into the living room. Laura followed her, and began to panic when she realised that she hadn’t vacuumed. 

Carmilla didn’t seem to mind, though, plopping herself down on the sofa. 

Laura joined her on the same sofa, but on the other end. They sat in awkward silence for a couple of minutes.

“So… are you gonna put a movie on or are we enjoying the Oscar-winning _Two Hours of Blackness_?”

Laura jumped off of the sofa. “Oh, yeah, right! Movies!” She crouched down in front of her TV. “We have… _Letters to Juliet, 50 First Dates, The Proposal…”_

“Do you have anything other than awful rom-coms?” 

“Excuse you I think you mean _awesome_ rom-coms!”

“Whatever helps you sleep at night, cutie.”

Laura shot Carmilla an angry look, then turned back to her stack of DVDs. Sure, the idea of watching a romantic movie with Carmilla had appealed to her. But if she’d rather watch something else, fine.

“I have Stardust?”

“As long as it’s not some cheesy romance flick I’m fine.”

“Oh. Well it does have a romantic plot line, but it’s also got princes and witches and-“

“Just put it on,” Carmilla sighed. 

Laura smiled, putting the disc into the player and going back to the sofa. She sat closer to Carmilla than her original position. They still weren’t touching, but it would have been super easy for Laura to lean her head on Carmilla’s shoulder. If she wanted to. 

Which she kinda did. 

Except Carmilla slightly shifted away from Laura, which was totally okay. Laura couldn’t blame her. Even if it did make Laura feel like she’d been punched in the throat. It was fine. 

“I’ve always liked that idea, of the stars watching us,” she said, to break the silence. 

“That’s stupid. The stars are just balls of gas,” Carmilla drawled. 

“Well sorry little-miss-killjoy. I just like the idea, I didn’t say I _believed_ it.” 

She heard Carmilla sigh. 

“Don’t get me wrong, okay? I love the stars. But part of their appeal is their distance, their objectivity. The stars don’t give a shit if you mess something up. They don’t care, they’re gonna keep on shining. I guess it’s nice to know that something out of all of this is eternal, you know? And imagining them as people just ruins that, because people will always let you down in the end.”

Laura sucked in a breath. That was the first time Carmilla had said so much in one go. It was the first time she’d seemed genuinely passionate about something. And it made her all the more beautiful. 

“I dunno,” Laura said, completely ignoring the movie at this point, “there’s something comforting about having someone watching over you? Like the people you lost being immortalised or whatever?” 

“I guess,” Carmilla relented, bringing her knees up to her chest. “I’d probably agree if I lost someone who I actually cared about.” 

Laura had a slightly crazy thought, but before she could stop herself she was saying it. “Well, I’d mind if I lost you.”

“Yeah,” Carmilla agreed. “In a friend way though.”

_Goddammit._

 


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> im really sorry this took so long   
> there was a big fiasco with a notebook and... well... i got it back though so it's all good!!!!!

Carmilla woke up slowly, which made a nice change from her alarm blaring. She felt warm and became aware of the soft breathing of someone pressed against her. 

Her eyes snapped open when she realised who it was. 

Oh no.

Laura had an arm around her, and was leaning her head on her shoulder. They must have fallen asleep on the sofa sometime after Tristan had been crowned King… it was blurry. Carmilla hadn’t paid much attention. She was pretty unimpressed with the movie to be honest. She just didn’t understand the characters’ motivations. Immortality wouldn’t be fun. It’d be lonely. 

Unless you found someone to share it with. 

Carmilla frowned, furious with herself. She’d promised to distance herself from Laura. That had lasted all of three hours. 

She couldn’t let herself get close to this girl, it would only end badly. She knew from experience. 

Yet, as she sat there with Laura against her, she couldn’t quite bring herself to leave. That’d mean waking Laura up, and she was sleeping so peacefully that it was probably illegal to disturb her. 

She was meant to be working, but LaF could probably handle the store. She could afford to lie in a little. 

Plus it wasn’t that bad. She could deal. 

* * *

Okay, cuddling Laura was nice and all but it was now eleven am and her neck was seriously cramping. 

Slowly, Carmilla reached out and poked Laura in the cheek, careful not to hurt her. 

“Laura?” she whispered, poking her again, “Laaaaaaura.” 

The smaller girl groaned a little bit, and shifted slightly, holding onto Carmilla tighter. 

“You’ve got to wake up…”

Still nothing.

“Laura it’s almost noon.” 

“Let me sleep!” 

“Taylor Swift is on the radio-“

“WHAT?!”

Carmilla had to dodge Laura in order to not be head-butted in the chin. She bit her lip to stop herself from laughing as she watched the tiny girl jump up to her feet and look around wildly for a few seconds before realising what was going on.

“That wasn’t very funny,” she pouted. 

“On the contrary, cupcake, it was hilarious.” 

Laura wrinkled her nose in anger which, okay, was kind of the cutest thing ever.

You’re in too damn deep, Karnstein. 

“Now come on, I gotta shower and get dressed in my own damn apartment,” Carmilla stood up from the couch and walked through to the hall. 

“Okay, fine” Laura called after her, “but then you’re coming back to help me paint the last wall!”

“Sure, but first I’m introducing you to LaF!” Carmilla yelled as she walked across the landing to her own apartment, closing the door behind her. 

* * *

“Okay, before you go in, I should probably warn you about LaFontaine,” Carmilla said, her hand hovering over the doorknob.”They can be quite… blunt? Like they’d never be mean or anything but they also don’t sugar-coat stuff. And the worst part is they’re frustratingly always right.”

Laura just rolled her eyes. “I’m sure I can handle it.” 

Carmilla shrugged, then opened the door, holding it open as Laura stepped into the storeroom. 

“Hey, LaF!” Carmilla called as she closed the door behind her. 

“What’s up you useless lesbian?” came the reply from the front of the shop.

“Frustratingly always right, huh?” Laura raised an eyebrow and Carmilla felt dread settle in her stomach. She hadn’t made new friends in a while and had forgotten that they actually had to establish that kind of stuff. She literally had no straight friends and forgotten the ‘straight until proven otherwise’ mentality. 

“Uuuh… yeah.” 

She walked out of the storeroom, refusing to look at Laura’s expression, and hoping upon hope that she hadn’t just scared away the only decent thing about working in this damn place. 

LaFontaine was standing at the cash register, but turned around when Carmilla walked in. 

“And who’s this?” they asked, and Carmilla felt the tension in her stomach release as she realised that, yes, Laura was still behind her and hadn’t run for the hills. Yet. 

“Hi, I’m Laura!” she said, before sneezing. Even her sneezes were adorable. 

Carmilla saw LaFontaine’s eyes widen and a brief look of confusion cross their face. 

“Really? You?”

“Um, yeah?” 

“Sorry, but from Carmilla’s description I was expecting… a different kind of person.”

“Really? And what exactly has Carmilla been telling you about me?” Laura said, a small smirk on her lips. Carmilla shot LaFontaine a warning look, and they seemed to understand as they didn’t mention the hours she spent talking about how beautiful Laura was, and just shrugged. 

“Only that you were a tattoo artist.”

“Why does everyone react like that?” Laura pouted. 

“No offence, sweetheart,” Carmilla wrapped her arm around Laura’s shoulders, “but tattoos are cool. And you’re kind of… not.” 

“I”m cool!” 

Carmilla burst out laughing. “Honey, you’re wearing a t-shirt for a band called _Harry and the Potters._ ”

“They’re cool!” 

Before Carmilla had the time to explain exactly why that was the wrongest sentence ever said in the history of mankind, the chimes at the front of the store rang, alerting them of a rare customer. 

“Welcome to Florist Gump, can I help you?” LaFontaine smiled at the skinny, balding man. 

“Um, no, just looking.”

Carmilla furrowed her brow. Who comes into a florists to _browse?_ Surely you go there for a purpose? It’s not like a clothes shop or anything, no one impulse buys _flowers._

Sometimes she really hated working in customer service. 

“Anyway,” she said, turning back to LaFontaine, “we just thought we’d say hi before we go back to painting.” 

“It was really nice to meet you!” Laura grinned and Carmilla didn’t doubt for a second that the girl actually meant it.

“Yeah yeah LaF’s a real pleasure to have in class and all that, but we better get back to work.” Carmilla headed back through the storeroom, leading Laura by the hand with her. 

“You do realise your job is _here,_ right?” LaFontaine called after her.

“You can handle it!”

“No I can’t! We actually have a customer!”

* * *

“They seemed nice!” Laura bounced back into the tattoo parlour.

“Really? I kind of hate them,” Carmilla said, stepping into the partially decorated space. 

“What, why?” 

“Okay so ‘hate’ is a strong word. They annoy me and I want to kill them, but if anyone else dared say that I’d rip their arms off, so.” 

“Aww, you are capable of liking people!” Laura smiled wide. 

_You have no idea._

Laura crouched down and picked up the paint can, holding it in front of Carmilla. “Can you paint the last wall over there while I call my supplier?”

Carmilla peered at the powder-blue paint and scoffed, “Seriously? That’s gonna look ridiculous, you should make a darker colour.”

Laura said nothing, continuing to hold the paint with a determined expression. 

“The bright colours make it seem childish.” 

Laura continued to stare, saying nothing. 

“I could get you a darker blue, or purple…” 

Still no answer. 

“Ugh, _fine,”_ Carmilla relented, taking the paint from Laura and snatching a brush from the floor. Laura’s face broke into a huge grin and she hugged Carmilla. 

“Thank you!” 

Then she ran off into the other room to make a phone call. 

Carmilla stared at the wall, paint in one hand and a brush in the other. Right now it was an ugly vomit-green. She’d be happy to see it go. Still, with such a light blue it’d take quite a few coats to not shine through.

Carmilla dipped the brush in the paint, then dragged it along the wall, thinly covering it in a layer of blue. From the other room she could hear Laura chirping on about an ‘epidermis’ or whatever. She sounded genuinely interested in the conversation, and Carmilla was sure she really was. That girl cared about everything. 

Carmilla smiled to herself as she painted along the wall. She recognised Laura’s innocence, her enthusiasm. She also knew how it could be destroyed. 

Or how it could destroy her. 

Carmilla crouched down to paint the bottom of the wall. It really was a bad colour Who’d ever heard of a tattoo parlour with _sky blue walls?_ Not to mention that a darker colour would take fewer coats to cover up the revolting green that was shining through. 

But, you know, Laura wanted it light blue. 

So. 

“Okay awesome bye!” Laura walked through as Carmilla was just finishing up the lower section of the wall. “Okay, so I’m getting a delivery tomorrow and then, once this wall’s painted, I think we’re done!” 

“Awesome!” Carmilla smiled. Laura squealed and pulled her into a bone-crushing hug. 

Of course. Not only did Carmilla have a crush on a straight girl, she had a crush on a straight girl who loves _platonic hugging._

_An open letter to the universe: why?_

 


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> kirsch is awesome. laura is just as oblivious as carmilla. what's new.

“What exactly is the point of me being here?” Carmilla grumbled.

“We open in two days, we have to do some publicity!” 

“And that requires me to stand around here in the freezing cold handing out flyers?”

“Yes!”

They were standing in the middle of the town square, with throngs of people milling about doing their weekend shopping. Laura had to admit that it _was_ cold, but at least she’d put on a coat, unlike Carmilla who was just wearing ripped jeans and a tight top which… wow. Still, she had no place to complain when she didn’t even bother putting on a sweater. 

“‘Color Me Cute’, opening on Monday!” Laura called as she handed some flyers to a man who was walking past. She looked over to Carmilla, who was just standing around looking bored. She wasn’t even attempting to talk to anyone. 

“If you’re gonna do nothing you might as well go back to your own store.” 

“And listen to LaFontaine’s extensive list of flower puns?” Carmilla scoffed, “Not a chance! Plus, the view here’s not bad.” 

Laura looked around. Other than the impressive fountain in the middle of the square, the view was just shop fronts and a dull, grey library building. 

Unless.. what that flirting? That was totally flirting, right? 

Then Laura remembered what Carmilla had says a few nights back. ‘In a friend way.’

She shook her head slightly, laughing. She really had to stop getting ahead of herself. Of course they were just friends. Who’d flirt with her? 

“You okay, cutie? You’ve been quiet for ages.”

“What?” Laura jumped out of her skin when Carmilla’s hand touched her shoulder. 

“You’ve kind of got that blank pop-people face on right now,” Carmilla said, lightly tapping her on the nose. 

“Sorry, just thinking.” 

“What about?”

“The fact that we’re not gonna have any customers on Monday unless you hand out some damn flyers!” 

Carmilla rolled her eyes before grabbing hold of a random person in the crowd who was walking by. It was a wide-eyed spotty teenager who seemed to be completely in awe of someone as beautiful as Carmilla touching their arm. 

Laura could relate. 

“Hey, wanna disappoint your parents and make life choices you’re gonna regret five years down the line? Try permanently marking your skin!” she smiled sarcastically before handing them a crumpled flyer and sending them on their way. 

“Carmilla!” 

“What?” 

“Why are you being so awkward and cranky?”

“This is just boring… I mean come on, how many people right in front of the library on a Saturday evening want a _tattoo?_ Unless you’re going for the single-mothers demographic.”

“Well what do you suggest?” 

Laura only began to realise she shouldn’t have asked that when Carmilla raised an eyebrow and smirked dangerously. 

“I have an idea.” 

* * *

This was not what Laura had been expecting. She crossed her arms over her chest, feeling out of place. 

Carmilla, on the other hand, seemed in her element, weaving through people who were all dressed much cooler than Laura could ever hope to be. 

“Kirsch!” Carmilla yelled, waving down a huge dude who was standing at the front of the stage. He smiled and walked over to them both. 

“Hey Carm! Hey Carm’s girlfriend!”

“Oh nononono, we’re just friends!” Carmilla’s reply was so frantic that Laura felt a little insulted. She knew she wasn’t Carmilla’s type but _still._ She didn’t have to seem so disgusted at the concept. 

“Oh okay, sorry. I’m Kirsch and you’re… really short,” he looked down at Laura with a lopsided smile. 

“I’m Laura, and you’re practically a giant! To be honest though, Danny may possibly be taller than you.” 

“Oh so Danny’s tall huh?” Carmilla asked with an odd tinge of malice in her voice. 

“Uuh, yeah?”

“It’s for the best you two broke up, you would have looked ridiculous walking down the street.”

“We did! Everyone thought Danny played basketball but it was really athletics-“

“Oh, a brainless jock, how surprising!” Carmilla drawled. 

“What’s your prob-“

“Uh, ladies? As much as I’d love to stand and watch you two argue for a few more hours, the band’s about to go on. Feel free to stay, though, the sound’s actually great from here.” 

“And why on earth would we want to be able to hear? Kirsch, I love you and all, but I’d rather make out with a cheese grater than listen to your band. You’re like if One Direction actually tried to write their own songs and play their own instruments. There’s a reason it’s all done for them.” 

“Actually,” Laura piped up, “a lot of the songs on _Four_ were written-“

“You’re ruining my insult, creampuff,” Carmilla smiled, “But you’re adorable so I’ll forgive you. And I’m also gonna protect your pretty ears from this train wreck of a band.”

“Hey!” Kirsch sounded offended. 

Carmilla just made the ‘rock and roll’ gesture sarcastically, before taking Laura by the hand and guiding her through the crowd who were all very tall and loud. They made their way over to the other side of the dingy venue. 

“We can stand here and hand out flyers,” Carmilla offered, “you can still hear the band but at least you’re not being deafened.”

Laura leaned her back against a sticky wall. She’d been to a few concerts in her life, but she was pretty sure this would be different to a 5sos gig.

“So… you’re friends with someone in a band, huh? That’s pretty cool.” 

“Trust me, Kirsch is pretty much the least cool guy you’ll ever meet. And I only know him because my brother was in the band for a few months in high school.” 

“You have a brother?

“Uh, yeah?”

“I never knew that.” Laura was all of a sudden hit with the realisation that she knew hardly anything about Carmilla. Carmilla knew tons about Laura (admittedly she people hadn’t _wanted_ to know any of that stuff, Laura just had a habit of blurting it out.)

“Well we don’t really talk any more.” 

“Why not?”

Carmilla looked like she was about to say something, but in the end she just shrugged. “Why does anybody do anything?”

Laura was conflicted, because on one hand Carmilla was hilariously broody and philosophical, but it was also… kind of totally attractive. 

“So how come you’re working in a florists?” she pressed on, determined to find something out about the mysterious girl, “I mean I _love_ my job but - forgive me if I’m wrong - you don’t seem particularly enthusiastic about the whole… flower… business.”

Carmilla gave Laura a smile, dropping the hand holding the flyers to her side and leaning one shoulder on the wall. 

“I had big plans after high school. You know, typical whiny pop punk ‘I hate this town’ shit. I was gonna move to the city, make my life, you know all the cliches. But it um…” she rubbed her hand nervously against her thigh, “it didn’t really work out.”

“Why not?” 

“Long story, cupcake. But I found myself with nowhere to go after graduation so… well I hadn’t seen LaFontaine since middle school, but I was really desperate. So I called them up and they offered me a job. I even got the apartment above the place which was a really sweet deal, so who am I to complain? Although I’m pretty sure this isn’t what I’m gonna do forever.” 

“What do you want to do?” Laura turned so she was facing Carmilla. 

“I dunno. I never really got that far. I just wanted to get out of this town but I’ve even managed to fuck that up.” 

“Well you know if you’d managed to leave as soon as you graduated, you’d never have met me,” Laura said, “and then who the hell would put up those shelves for me?”

“Very true. You’d probably have died by now without me.” 

“Exactly.” 

Carmilla grins, and Laura’s all of sudden aware of how close they are, and how pretty Carmilla is when she smiles.

It would be really easy to lean in and kiss her, but Laura stops herself. Although she really _really_ wanted to kiss Carmilla, the other girl wanted to just be friends for some reason. 

(Who was she kidding. She knew the reason.) 

So Laura settled for grinning. Just because she couldn’t kiss Carmilla didn’t mean she couldn’t enjoy making her smile. 

 


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> sorry this one is so short but in my defence 1.) you guys got two chapters in two days and 2.) the next chapters gonna be an experience :))))))))))

_For god’s sake, Laura, you’re making it really hard to not kiss you._

She was smiling and laughing and biting her lip and _jesus._

Why did she have to be straight? That just wasn’t fair. (Then again, the universe had repeatedly made it’s hatred of Carmilla clear so this really shouldn’t have come as a surprise.)

“Uh, cutie?”she said, mostly to give her mouth something to do that wasn’t kissing Laura, “I think the band’s about to go on.” 

Just as she said that, four plaid covered buffoons lumbered onto the stage. Carmilla recognised Kirsch, and she was pretty sure that the lanky guitarist was JP, who had been best friends with Will for a while. As for the other two, she had no idea. They hadn’t been in the band when Will was. In fact, she figured the only original member still present was Kirsch. 

Carmilla hated him. She could only imagine how uncomfortable Laura must have felt when he called them girlfriends. Thankfully she’d managed to backtrack, so as to avoid any confusion. But she’d been panicking. 

“Hey, we are Zeta Omega Mu!” Kirsch yelled, and a few people in the crowd cheered, holding up beer bottles. 

“They named their band after a fraternity, which is some social statement about brotherhood extending beyond college or something lame like that,” Carmilla whispered to Laura. 

“This first song is about betrayal.”

A poppy riff started up on JP’s guitar, then one of the unidentified members began a drum beat. It was possibly one of the most generic, unexciting pop-punk songs Carmilla had ever heard. She looked over to Laura who was bopping her head along to the beat and, yeah, that was adorable.

Kirsch sauntered up to the microphone and began to sing in a voice that was more shouting than actual singing. 

 

_We were going so well,_

_Staying safe, on the right track,_

_But then you went and ruined it all,_

_How can I get my trust back?_

 

_How can you expect me to love again?_

_I can’t believe to betrayed me like that_

_You hit me…_

 

_With a blue shell on rainbow road,_

_Blue shell on rainbow road,_

_Blue shell, blue shell,_

_A blue shell on rainbow road_

 

“Dear god make it stop,” Carmilla whined. It was bad enough that she’d had to listen to that song being rehearsed from her brother’s bedroom in high school, but at a concert it was even worse (which she hadn’t thought possible.)

“It’s not too bad,” Laura said.

“You must be delirious.” They both laughed. 

The final chords rang in Carmilla’s ears as the crowd went wild. (Thank god it’s over.)

“Thank you! Are you guys having a good time tonight?”

Everyone cheered. 

“Before we play our next song, I, uh, have an announcement to make.” 

JP and unidentified band member number two shared a confused look. Clearly this wasn’t planned. Carmilla smiled. 

“If you guys are looking for any tattoos, check out this new place opening on Monday! My friends in the back can give you details!”

“Oh my god that’s _me!”_ Laura squealed, “that’s _my business!”_

“Sure is, cutie.” 

Laura was jumping up and down smiling so hard it looked like her face might split in half. Which would suck. Carmilla liked Laura’s face in one piece. (Still, seeing her this happy could never be a bad thing.) 

“But how…” realisation dawned on the girl’s face, “did you have something to do with this?” 

“I may have sent a text to Kirsch this afternoon.” 

Suddenly Carmilla found herself almost bowled over with 5”2’ of pure gratitude. 

“Thankyouthankyouthankyou!”

Carmilla had been wrong. Laura being a hugger was definitely _not_ a problem. It was pretty much the opposite of a problem. 

“You’ve gotta let go now,” she said, “I think you’ve got some interested customers.”

“Really?!” Laura broke the hug and turned around to look at the crowd now surrounding them. Carmilla smiled watching the tiny girl hand out flyers to surly-looking punk rockers. 

“This next song is called ‘You Ate My Pizza You Bitch.’”

Another equally terrible song began. Okay, so maybe Kirsch’s band wasn’t _awful._ They sure as hell weren’t _good_ but they knew how to play to a crowd. The energy in the room was infectious, and Carmilla couldn’t stop herself from swaying slightly to the beat. 

Laura was still busying herself, talking animatedly with a bearded guy who looked pretty interested. 

What the heck, she could handle herself. What did Carmilla have to lose?

She went into the crowd to dance. 

 


	8. Chapter 8

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> this is VERY LONG and also a wild ride so, uh, buckle up creampuffs??????

“That was _great!”_ Laura said, running over to Kirsch after the show. She hadn’t been to that many concerts, and certainly hadn’t been to any that involved the crowds pushing each other and jumping on top of each other, but still, she’d had a great time. 

(Granted, she hadn’t been involved in the dancing and the jumping and if she had she’d probably have _died,_ but still.)

“Thanks,” Kirsch said unenthusiastically. He was sitting on the stage, his legs falling over the side. Laura jumped up to join him, and laughed when she noticed that her feet were dangling, at least a foot away from touching the ground. But the laugh died in her throat when she saw Kirsch’s expression. 

“What’s wrong?” 

“They uh…” he glanced around at the roadies dragging amps away from the stage, “they kicked me out of the band.” 

“What, why?” Laura had only known Kirsch for three hours and most of that time had been watching him yelling into a microphone, but she still felt sorry for the guy. He looked completely broken. 

“They didn’t like me advertising your place.” 

Laura felt a stab of guilt in her chest. She’d ruined something for someone she’d _just met._ That was a new low, even for her. 

“I’m so so sorry Kirsch I had no idea-“

“It’s not your fault,” He didn’t make eye contact, “Carm asked for the promo, you didn’t know it was gonna happen, and _she_ didn’t know it would get me kicked out and… I should have checked with JP and the guys. It was really a dick move of mine.”

“I thought it was really sweet.” Laura put her hand on his shoulder and at last he looked over, smiling slightly. 

“Thanks little nerd hottie.” 

They sat in silence for a while. The crowds had cleared away, leaving an empty venue with empty plastic cups and bottles strewn around. Some people were sweeping up, but all of the band members had left. 

“You know what? I’m not even sad because I liked the band. In fact, I kind of hated it,” Kirsch laughed, “JP was a dick. And our music sucked.” 

Laura didn’t know whether it would be comforting or not to say that she actually liked their music, so she kept her mouth shut. 

“I’m just worried because, like, this was the only thing I had going for me. And it was awful but it was something. And now I’m two years out of high school and I have no clue what to do now.” 

Laura thought back to a similar conversation she’d had a few hours before. 

Then she was hit with an idea. 

An idea that was probably awful and Kirsch would probably refuse but she felt so bad about getting him fired (were people ‘fired’ from bands?) that she had to try, right? 

“Well, I know it’s not a permanent solution, and I also totally get if you don’t want to or anything but…” she took a deep breath. Rambling. Right. “Colour Me Cute needs a receptionist? And I understand that it’s not really a cool job and it’ll be boring and you don’t want to be stuck with that job forever but I figured that it’s something and if for right now you feel a little lost or you want to earn some money or-“

“Laura?” Kirsch put his hand on her elbow to get her to stop. “I’d love to!” 

Laura felt the pressure on her chest lift. She’d done something good. That was… a really rare feeling. 

“Great! Um, we start on Monday so I guess if I don’t see you tomorrow then I’ll see you there!”

She jumped off of the stage, landing heavily on the ground. She’d misjudged just how far it was for someone her height to fall. 

“Hey, where’s Carmilla?” 

“I dunno,” Laura said. She’d kind of assumed that she’d just gone home. It wouldn’t be the first time someone had left Laura halfway through a night. And it wasn’t like it was a date or whatever so it was perfectly fine. 

“Dude we gotta go find her.”

“Why? She’s probably just gone off to some angry existentialist punk rock fight club thing. You know how she is.” 

“No way dude,” Kirsch pushed off the stage, and stood up with ease. “She wouldn’t just leave you like that.” 

“Why wouldn’t she? Everyone else has no problems with it.” 

“Yeah, but Carmilla likes you.” 

Laura felt her heart flutter slightly. “Really?” 

“Well she hasn’t tried to kill you yet, and she does that to most people. She even did it to me, and we’re, like, mega-bros at this point.” 

“I’m sure you are,” Laura laughed, but what Kirsch said still bounced around her head. _Carmilla likes you._

And Laura knew that it wasn’t in the way she wanted, and she knew that Carmilla would probably never like her that way, but even a friend way was nice. She was constantly terrified that her friends were just pretending to like her and in reality only tolerated her, and hearing such a definite confirmation from someone who actually knew Carmilla was something Laura needed more than she thought she did. 

“Dude can you hear Taylor Swift?” Kirsch said. Laura was about to applaud him for being able to recognise one of the most important female artists of the twenty first century by a drumbeat, when she realised that it was her phone. 

She took it out of her pocket to find an unknown number calling. Confused, she pressed the green button and brought it to her ear.

“Hello?”

“Laura? It’s LaFontaine. You’ve gotta come to the hospital immediately.” 

“What?” 

“It’s Carmilla.”

* * *

Laura drove. Despite Kirsch’s protests, she insisted. 

Although it was hard to focus on the road when her heart was thumping and her hands were shaking and she was finding it hard to breathe. The streetlights lining the road were blurring and she realised she was crying. 

“Laura, it’s gonna be okay,” Kirsch offered helpfully, but Laura knew he was just saying that. He knew exactly what Laura did, which was one very vague and panicked phone call from LaFontaine. He couldn’t know it would be okay. 

Oh god please let it be okay. 

Let _her_ be okay. 

They pulled up to the hospital in a daze. Laura found a space for her van and parked it as soon as possible. She didn’t even look at Kirsch as she pushed open the door and rushed across the parking lot. It was raining, and she was vaguely aware of cold water splashing her jeans as she ran, but her mind was too panicked to care. 

She burst into Accident and Emergency and looked wildly around. There were people there, cradling broken arms or holding pressure to gushing wounds, and she became aware of how crazed she must look. But she _felt_ crazed. 

Her mind was in full blown panic mode and Carmilla wasn’t there and she was probably seriously hurt and Laura couldn’t do anything and… and… 

“Laura.” 

Kirsch’s hand rested on her shoulder and she forced herself to breathe. 

“Why don’t you take a seat over there and I’ll ask at reception, okay?” 

Laura nodded, not trusting herself to say anything, and walked over to one of the plastic chairs set up. A mother side-eyed her suspiciously but she couldn’t care. Next to her a table offered magazines discussing weight loss techniques and celebrity tans as if Carmilla wasn’t possibly _dying._

“They said she was taken in an hour ago, so something must have happened at the gig,” Kirsch said, taking the seat text to Laura, “and we can’t go in to see her because we’re not family and we weren’t with her at the time of the accident.” 

Laura took a few rattling breaths, trying to stop herself from shaking. This wasn’t like last time. 

* * *

Laura was awoken by Kirsch gently tapping her arm.

“Hey Laura, look who’s here.” 

She lifted her head from Kirsch’s shoulder, to find LaFontaine leading Carmilla through the double doors into the waiting room, holding an ice pack to her head. 

All of a sudden all of the worry and all of the stress melted away. _She was fine._

Laura jumped off her seat and was in front of Carmilla before she knew it. 

“What happened?” she asked. There were probably more important things to say, but when has her brain ever done what was important?

“Uh, from what I can tell,” LaFontaine answered, “she hit her head off something during the concert. The doctor said it was probably barrier or a wall judging by the head trauma.” 

Laura looked between the two of them. Carmilla was staring into space with her eyes worryingly glazed over. 

“Yeah, she’s got a concussion. Apparently she’ll be fine to go home but she’ll experience some symptoms like uh, retrograde amnesia, dizziness, loss of balance, that kinda thing. But we’re to call if she has a seizure or if her nose or ears start leaking brain fluid.” 

“Gross.”

“Yeah,” LaFontaine laughed, “oh and she can’t sleep, at least not for a few more hours until we’re sure she’s gonna recover.”

“I was really worried.” 

“Yeah, sorry for that phone call that probably didn’t make any sense but in my defence I thought it was a lot more serious than it was. There was a _lot_ of blood.” 

“Well I think we’ve all had too much excitement for one night,” Kirsch said. “Did you drive Carmilla here?” 

“An ambulance got us.” 

“It did?”

This was the first thing Laura had heard Carmilla say, and her voice sounded so small and young and _scared_ that Laura just wanted to hug her. But that would be totally inappropriate and could possibly hurt her, so she kept her arms at her sides. 

“Yeah, you called me and I turned up to find you waiting outside with a bleeding head, remember? I called the emergency services,” LaFontaine said gently. 

“I…” Carmilla screwed her eyes up in frustration, “I don’t remember.” 

“That’s fine, that’s just a side affect of the concussion, it’ll come back soon I promise,” Laura stroked Carmilla’s arm soothingly. “I’ll drive you all home, there’s space in the back of my van.” 

The four of them walked slowly out of A&E. Laura rubbed sleep from her eyes. She guessed it was about three am by now. When they reached the van, she slid the heavy door open and gestured for Kirsch and LaFontaine to climb in. They obliged, finding seats in between all the DIY crap stuffed in there. 

Carmilla went to follow them, but Laura grabbed her by the arm. 

“No, you’re gonna sit in the front so I can keep an eye on you.”

“Okay.” 

“And hold this ice to where it hurts.” 

“Fine.” 

The lack of protesting probably should have worried Laura more, but she was just so relieved that Carmilla was okay. 

She held the door open as Carmilla climbed gingerly into the passenger seat, then she walked around the van and got into the drivers seat. 

“Where am I taking you guys?” 

“Uh, I live on Anderson Avenue, so just drop me off at the Walmart and I can walk,” LaF said from the back of the van. 

“I’m right on the edge of town, Davis Park,” came Kirsch’s reply. 

“Okay cool,” Laura started up the engine and pulled out of the space. “We’ve gotta keep you awake so let’s do a little memory-test, alright?” 

“Sure,” Carmilla’s voice was distant which was probably not a good sign.

“What’s my name?” 

“Laura.” 

“What’s my favourite tv show?” 

“Doctor Who.”

“Who was the fifteenth president of the United States?”

“I wouldn’t even know that without extreme head trauma, sweetheart.” 

“What’s the name of your store?”

“Florist Gump.” 

“And what does it sell?” 

“Tampons.” 

“Were you being sarcastic there?” 

“What do you think, genius?”

“Glad to see being bumped around in the head hasn’t made you any less of an asshole.” 

“I think it’d take more than that.” 

Laura laughed, and focused on the road. It had stopped raining but the puddles were reflecting the orange glow of the streetlights. It was clear enough to see some stars. She smiled, then glanced over at Carmilla. Her eyes were drooping dangerously. 

“Nononono don’t fall asleep!” Laura said, trying to keep her eyes on the road. “Okay, right, uh… what Harry Potter book’s your favourite?” 

“Order of the Phoenix.” 

“Really? I found that one incredibly frustrating, especially with Harry’s self-absorption, although it _did_ provide some great development for Ginny’s character and… anyway I’m meant to be asking you questions not rambling about Harry Potter.”

“Ramble all you want cutie, it’s relaxing.” 

“And that is exactly what we DON’T need right now. So… quick fire round!”

“Quick fire wha-“

“What was your favourite subject in school?” 

“English.” 

“When did we first meet?” 

“Last week… tuesday I think.” 

“What did I draw on your arm?” 

“Just swirls the first time, then a flower.” 

“If you could have one superpower what would it be?”

“That’s not really a test of my memory.” 

“Yeah I know but I’m interested!” 

“The ability to control time, or go back and change things.” 

“If you were stuck on a desert island-“

“A speedboat.”

“You didn’t even let me finish!”

“I didn’t have to!” 

“Oh really? So if you were stuck on a desert island and could only bring three CDs with you you’d bring a _speedboat?”_

“Oh yeah because when I’m stuck on a desert island my main concern is what music I’m gonna listen to.”

Laura sighed in frustration. Apparently cranial injury didn’t stop Carmilla from being one of the _most infuriating people ever._ She was running out of questions, but they were still far from being home. 

“Do either of you have any suggestions?” she called to the back of the van. 

“Ooh, I do!” Kirsch said. He cleared his throat, then Laura could hear him making some… noises?

“Doh, dohdohdoh, dohdohdoh…”

LaFontaine joined in, clapping on the off-beats. Carmilla began to groan from the passenger seat, but Laura was still confused as to what was going on. 

Until they started singing. 

“THIS HIT THAT ICE COLD, MICHELLE PFEIFFER, THAT WHITE GOLD,” Kirsch and LaF all but screamed. 

“I think I’d rather brain fluid came out of my ears at this point,” Carmilla said. Although what she was saying sounded like what she’d always say, her speech was slowed and slightly slurred, which really made her comments lose their scathing edge. 

“I’m confused,” Laura said. 

“Uptown Funk, cutie?”

“DON’T BELIEVE ME JUST WATCH!” 

Laura had to keep her eyes on the road, but judging by the noise coming from behind her, LaF and Kirsch were dancing as they tried to replicate a saxophone solo. 

“Come on, Carm, you gotta sing along with us!” 

“Why the hell would I want to do that?”

“It’ll keep you awake!” 

“Not gonna happen, Missing Link.” 

“Fine, but we’re not gonna- COS UPTOWN FUNK GON’ GIVE IT TO YA!”

* * *

**4:57**

Laura parked the van on the side of the main road. It was almost morning now, the dark sky streaked with light pink. 

“Come on, Carm, just a few more hours and you can sleep.” 

“I wanna sleep noooooooow,” came the reply, slightly muffled as Carmilla’s face was pressed against the window. 

“I know, I know, and in a few hours you can. Come on!” Laura got out of the van, then walked around it to open the door for Carmilla, who grumpily clambered out onto the tarmac. 

They both slowly shuffled to the door in between the two storefronts. Laura’s legs felt stiff with cold and fatigue. 

She fumbled around with keys, yawning as she held the door open for Carmilla who stomped up the cold stairwell. Laura followed, until they were standing on the landing in between their front doors. 

“You still can’t sleep, so I’m gonna stay with you for a while, okay?” 

“I’m perfectly fine.” 

“You’re swaying.” 

“I am?” Carmilla’s brow was furrowed and she was very slightly rocking back and forth. Before now Laura had never really thought that ‘cute’ could describe the black-clad girl but… well… her confused face was adorable. 

“Yes, now come on, you gotta wash that blood out of your hair,” Laura opened her apartment door and gestured for Carmilla to come in. 

Carmilla rolled her eyes, but did as Laura asked. 

“So how’s this gonna work?” 

“What do you mean?” 

“Well like you said I have to wash this blood off, but you can’t exactly come into the shower with me.” 

Laura felt herself flush red. _Carmilla just wanted to be friends, Carmilla just wanted to be friends._  

“Well how about I sit outside the door and yell occasionally to check if you’re still awake?” 

**5:20**

“You still awake in there?” 

“Yes.” 

“Okay!”

**5:34**

Carmilla emerged from the bathroom wearing a set of pyjamas Laura had given her. (“I know it’s kinda lame but these are the only pyjamas I own that don’t have puppies on them, so.”)

Laura jumped up from her spot in the corridor (well, she didn’t ‘jump’. She was way too tired for that. She stood up. Slowly. With great effort.)

“Do you feel any more awake now?” 

“Not really.” 

“Uuh, okay, well I have coffee! Wait no I’m not sure if you’re allowed caffeine with a concussion…”

“You’re not allowed anything fun with a concussion,” Carmilla mumbled, sounding like a grumpy five year old, before walking through to Laura’s living room and falling face first on the sofa. 

“Nope!” Laura said, running in after her and pulling her to her feet, “no lying down! That’s how sleep happens!”

“Well then what do we do?” 

Laura thought for a moment. She was just as tired as Carmilla and her brain was beginning to feel sort of foggy. Her eyes scanned the cluttered room, until her gaze fell on a pile of CDs in the corner. 

“Let’s listen to some music! Some high energy going here.”

“It’s half five in the morning cutie I don’t think you’re gonna find much energy.”

“You are _wrong!”_ Laura said, rushing over to her CD collection. She looked down at the spines… until she found a plain box labelled ‘L’. 

This was a bad idea, right? It was probably the worst idea in existence to play _that_ CD. Especially since _Carmilla_ was there.

Still, it was the best shot she had of staying awake. 

“Alright, I’ve got one!” she said, putting the disc in the player. Immediately an upbeat song began to play. One of her favourites. She began moving to the beat awkwardly. 

Carmilla gave her a small smile.

“Come on, do as the song says!” Laura laughed, taking Carmilla’s hands in her own and moving them around a bit.

“And what exactly does the song say?” 

“Shut up and dance!” Laura echoed the band. Carmilla grinned, then obliged, beginning to jump around slightly. 

They were both too tired to actually dance _well_ so they settled for bopping and swaying like idiots. Laura was pretty sure Carmilla twirled her at some point. She wasn’t sure. 

The song ended and another one started. Laura grinned at the same time that Carmilla groaned. They both realised what it was. 

“Nope.” 

“Come on Carmilla, dance!”

“No way, sweetheart.” 

“Please, you’ve got to stay awake!” 

“I”ll stay awake to anything but this song.”

“You love it!”

“I really don’t.”

“Everyone loves this song!”

“You clearly have not met all that many people.”

Laura pouted, then decided the best course of action was to just keep dancing and singing until Carmilla eventually decided to give in. Which she totally would. How could you not love this song?

“Baby you light up my world like nobody else-”

“This isn’t happening-“

“The way that you flip your hair-“

“Please kill me.”

Laura wouldn’t take no for an answer. Sure, Carmilla pretended to be all cool but she _knew_ that deep down there was a dork in there. She just had to find it. So she kept singing, and dancing, until eventually Carmilla rolled her eyes and joined in. 

“You know all the words!” 

“Shut up.” 

Truimphant, Laura waited for the next song with baited breath. Thankfully, it was a safe old Fall Out Boy song. 

They both continued jumping around the living room, laughing. Carmilla was obviously finding it hard to keep her balance so Laura gripped her by the forearms to stop her from falling. Maybe it was just the fact that it was almost a full 24 hours since she’d slept, but Laura was having probably the most fun she’d ever had. 

The song was building, reaching the climax and Laura was getting more and more into it, possibly a little _too_ into it. She accidentally stood on her own shoelaces and went flying. 

She felt herself be caught by Carmilla, who helped her upright. 

“Woah I thought I was meant to be having the coordination issues,” she laughed, keeping her grip on Laura’s shoulders.

Laura was aware of Carmilla’s hands, and how close their faces were now. The last few chords hung in the air and there was a brief moment of silence where Laura could hear Carmilla’s heavy breathing. 

Then the next song started and _oh no._

“This song is a little slow to dance to, cupcake.” 

“We can still dance,” Laura said, putting on hand on Carmilla’s waist and swaying gently. Friends slow danced to Enrique Iglesias, right?

They danced slowly around the room and Laura was finding it increasingly hard to work Carmilla out. The longer they spent together the more complicated it seemed to become. But she was worth it. 

 

_I can be your hero baby,_

_I can kiss away the pain_

 

“Could you?” 

It was said so quietly, Laura had to make sure she’d heard it correctly.

“What?”

“What?”

“You said something.” 

“No I didn’t,” Carmilla said defensively. 

“I could.” 

“What?” 

Laura just smiled as Carmilla’s eyes widened. She stood up on her tiptoes and leaned forward, before pressing her lips softly to Carmilla’s temple where an impressive bruise was forming. 

“Better?”

"Much.”

 


	9. Chapter 9

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> a new character is introduced... a very prickly character

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1000 kudos holy crap!!!!  
> i can't even believe that many people READ it let alone liked it!!!! thank you guys so so much

Carmilla felt like she was floating through space, and it was only partially due to concussion and lack of sleep. 

The rest was due to Laura, and her ridiculous smile when she danced and how she somehow convinced Carmilla to do the most ridiculous things, and how she’d kissed her.

Of course, it was just a kiss on the forehead, but that was probably the closest Carmilla would ever get, and she wasn’t about to look a gift horse in the mouth. 

That horse had a really nice mouth. 

The song was still playing, soft and slow, and they were still close to one another. 

“This song is really good,” Carmilla said.

“Yeah Danny has a great taste, this mixtape was for our first anniversary.” 

“Oh. Danny. Right.” 

She felt like she’d been punched in the throat. Of course the CD was made by Danny. Tall, athletic Danny who had good taste in music and made mix tapes and was probably a totally awesome boyfriend. 

Not that Carmilla was bitter or anything.

“Uh, it’s probably okay for me to sleep now, cutie. And even if it’s not, you open tomorrow-“

“Oh my god so I do!” Laura’s eyes widened in a split second of panic before her face broke out into a huge smile. “It’s actually happening! Tomorrow!” 

“Yeah,” Carmilla smiled slightly. Laura was so beautiful that she almost didn’t mind that she couldn’t have her. Almost. 

Laura quickly went over to the CD player and pressed pause. The silence was slightly eerie. She turned back to Carmilla, looking slightly nervous. 

“If you want you could, uh, crash on the couch? I mean it’s practically morning so we’d be sleeping until 5pm anyway-“

“No it’s okay,” Carmilla said quickly. She didn’t want to intrude or make Laura feel uncomfortable. She’d already done enough. “I’m just gonna go over to my apartment.”

“Oh, okay,” Laura said. 

Carmilla nodded awkwardly, then turned, walking through the hall and to her own apartment. Even though she’d never met Danny he’d managed to ruin what was possibly a moment, and if she wasn’t so tired she’d probably feel really angry about that. 

As it was, all she wanted to do was sleep. 

* * *

“Carmilla, I know that we have an agreement about you not having to work when you’re uncomfortable or whatever, but I really need to help me with this delivery today.”

“But it’s Laura’s opening day!” 

“I know, and I’m really sorry,” LaF said, leaning on the counter, “but it’s a big delivery and… you know, Perry’ll be there.” 

Carmilla sighed. As much as she wanted to be there for Laura’s first day, she owed it to LaFontaine. They’d taken her in and given her a job that she sucked at, and never got mad when she messed up (which was often.) The least she could do was help them out when Perry came by.

“Okay, fine,” Carmilla dumped her bag in the storeroom, and the smile on LaF’s face made her sure she’d made the right choice. 

 

ball of dork: where r u?????

carmcussion: LaF needs me to work today, I’m really sorry.

ball of dork: :’(((((((

ball of dork: im kidding, ur job comes first!!!!!!!

ball of dork: plus, im super busy with customers from kirsch’s concert anyway

carmcussion: Still, I’m sad I’m missing it. 

ball of dork: how about i come round during my lunch break? might make it less boring

carmcussion: I think I might like that very much. 

ball of dork: awesome!!!! i’ve g2g, i have a customer (!!!!!)

 

Carmilla smiled down at her phone. At least today wouldn’t completely suck. 

“Hey, Carm, the truck’s here,” LaF said, and Carmilla could sense how nervous they were. They were fiddling with the buttons on their shirt and bouncing on the balls of their feet. 

Carmilla walked through the shop, out onto the tarmac of the loading dock. The van was waiting, and Perry was standing there. 

“So I have the pear blossoms here,” Perry said, handing over a box. “But the rest might need another trip.” 

Carmilla frowned. The rest? 

She decided not to press it, turning and carrying the pear blossoms into the store.

“Is she there?” LaF asked. 

“Yeah. What else is coming?” 

LaF grimaced slightly, and Carmilla knew what was coming. Whenever LaF made that face, it meant they’d come up with some hair-brained scheme. 

“So maybe I went and ordered some cacti-“

“You what?!”

“Look, our flowers aren’t selling. We need something new!”

“So you got cacti?!”

“Yep.” 

Carmilla rubbed her forehead, which was still pounding. Was it due to the huge bruise there from the concert, or due to LaFontaine’s ridiculous ideas? 

She wasn’t sure. 

“Okay, fine, well I guess I’ll go back there and pick them up… wanna come?” 

Carmilla knew what she was asking, and she knew how difficult it would be for LaF. But they nodded slowly. 

They walked out to the dock together, and Perry’s eyes widened when she caught sight of LaF. Clearly she had been expecting the cold shoulder to last for much longer. If Carmilla had been in charge, it could have. 

“So… how's life?” LaFontaine said, and Carmilla almost facepalmed in embarrassment. Honestly LaF's awkwardness was uncomfortable to even witness.

“I’m alright,” Perry answered with a smile that was just too wide and lasted just too long to be sincere. 

Carmilla rolled her eyes.

“Look, about what I said-“

“They don’t want to talk about it,” Carmilla jumped in before Perry could even start what was sure to be a half assed, guilt-tripping apology.

“Hey, it’s alright, you don’t have to answer for me,” LaF assured her. Then they turned to Perry. “I’m still mad about how you reacted.”

“I know, I was awful, and I’m really sorry!

“Sorry doesn’t cut it!” Carmilla could feel the rage building up inside her. How dare she try and apologise after everything she said to LaF?!

“Hey, Carm, how about you just take in the delivery?” LaF suggested in a way that made it clear it wasn’t so much a suggestion as an order. They were technically her manager after all.

Carmilla groaned but did as she was told, carrying the hefty box into the store, leaving LaF and Perry to sort their shit out.

* * *

 

“How did it go?” Carmilla asked when LaFontaine finally reentered the florists.

“Really great!” they smiled.

“Really? Did you finally yell at her?”

“What, no. We made up.”

Carmilla blinked. “What?”

“We made up. It was silly to stay mad at each other. And I really missed my best friend.”

“What the hell? Do you not remember what she said?” she clenched her fists. “Have you forgotten how hard you cried that night you turned up at my place?”

“Clearly you haven’t forgotten when it was the other way around.”

“Wait, what?”

LaFontaine ran their hand through their hair nervously, looking around at the shop as if something in there would come to the rescue.

“Do you think maybe you’re projecting your anger onto Perry when really you’re mad at… your… mom?”

Carmilla let out a shrill laugh. Now that was rich.

“Oh yeah obviously that’s it, because broody, angsty Carmilla is incapable of actually caring about her friend!”

“I wasn’t saying that-“

“No, you were just saying that whenever I’ve been looking out for you it’s just because of my fucked up family, right, Freud? Well believe it or not I don’t need an excuse to be a nice person once in a while. Perry should have accepted you.”

“Yeah, she should have.”

“I mean you’d known each other for _years_ , how can someone just turn around and dump you just because you opened up to them? That’s an asshole move.”

“Yeah, and so’s kicking you out of your house because of it.”

“I know, right? How could she…” Carmilla frowned. “Wait when did we start talking about my mother?”

“Vindicated,” LaF smiled, before putting a hand on Carmilla’s shoulder. “Look, don’t worry about Perry. I’m not gonna immediately run back into her arms and start braiding her hair. We have a lot to work through, but I’m willing to give it a shot. I’m a grown up, I can make my own decisions.”

“I just wanted to… after everything you’ve done for me…”

“I know. But let’s unbox those cacti, shall we?”

Carmilla nodded, realising that at some point in the conversation tears had formed in her eyes. She really was not good with sappy heart-to-heart moments, and thank god LaF wasn’t either.

Don’t know how to express how much you appreciate your friend? Unpack cacti with them instead!

“Uuh, I think there’s a problem,” Carmilla said as she opened up the box. Because inside, instead of multiple cacti, there was just one. And it was gigantic. 

“What? I ordered two hundred of them!” LaF said, rushing over to the cashier and pulling out a receipt. “See?Two hundred cacti… oh no wait, it’s one two hundred centimetre cactus. My bad.” 

“You accidentally bought one massive cactus?! LaF how can we sell this?” Carmilla said, standing up from the floor and pulling the cactus from the box. 

“We could make it our mascot! Put some sunglasses on him and call him Kevin?” 

“That is quite possibly the worst idea you’ve ever had."

* * *

 

“Heya!” the bell at the door rang as Laura walked in. “What’s up?” 

“LaFontaine bought a cactus.” Carmilla said in a voice that she hoped conveyed how ridiculous she thought the idea was. Unfortunately she seemed to have failed, as Laura just smiled wide and walked towards the ridiculous plant in the middle of the room. 

“That is so cool!” 

“His name is Kevin!” LaF called through from the storeroom. 

“Hi, Kevin!” 

“I’m surrounded by idiots,” Carmilla said in disbelief. “In an attempt to turn the conversation back to sanity… how’s it been going?” 

“Great!” Laura took out a packet of cookies and bit into one as she talked. “So far I’ve had one infinity sign and one song lyric. My next client’s at half two and I think it’s a full sleeve. But until then I’m on lunch break.” 

“Sounds fun.”

“So are the four of us gonna eat lunch together?” LaF asked, walking through. 

“Four of us?” 

“Yeah, you, me, Laura and Kevin.” 

“Unbelievable.”

* * *

 

Laura’s sneezes were genuinely adorable, like some woodland creature who seemed scared by their own sneezes and went viral on YouTube. 

“Bless you,” Carmilla said for the fifth time, handing her yet another tissue. “You know you wouldn’t get colds so often if you ever ate anything with vitamins or nutritional value.” 

“I know but… delicious cookies?” Laura sniffed. “I’m so sorry, I don’t know what’s come over me. I was completely find this morning!” 

She sneezed again.

“Uh, Laura? Has it ever occurred to you that it could be an allergy?” LaF said, tucking into their sandwich. 

Laura made a noise that was probably her attempting to ask a question, but she was once again interrupted by an epic sneeze that caused her entire body to jolt forward. 

“It’s probably not an allergy,” Carmilla said, but Laura’s eyes were watering and she kept sneezing. 

“What do you think, Kevin? Allergy?” LaFontaine said, turning to the cactus which was now sitting in the corner of the room wearing a snapback LaF had fished out of their backpack. 

Obviously, the cactus didn’t reply, but LaF acted like it did, nodding their head and saying,“yes I have to agree with you.” They turned back to Carmilla and Laura. “Kevin thinks it’s an allergy to the flowers.” 

“What, noooo,” Laura whined, “I don’t want to stop hanging out here.” 

Carmilla had to bite her lip to stop a smile spreading at the sight of Laura pouting and the fact that she’d just said she enjoyed her company. 

“Dude just take some hay fever meds, you’ll be fine,” Carmilla said. For some reason the thought of Laura staying away from the store was unbearable. 

She knew the reason. 

 


	10. Chapter 10

This sucked. This totally one hundred percent sucked. 

Laura had a crush on someone who not only didn **’** t like her back but also worked in a shop she **’** s allergic to, so she can **’** t even hang out there?!

That had to be the universe playing some kind of cruel trick. 

What did she do to deserve this? 

She always braked on the road to avoid hitting animals. She donated money to charity. She **’** d never killed anyone. 

Not directly anyway. 

So why was her life like this? 

 **“** If I can **’** t stay here, why don **’** t you come hang out at the parlour for a while? **”** Laura suggested desperately. 

Carmilla shook her head, maybe a little too quickly. **“** No can do, cupcake. I **’** ve gotta stay here. **”**  

 **“** No you don **’** t, **”** LaFontaine said. **“** The cacti **…** well, cact _us_ has been delivered, that was what I needed you for really.”

 **“** Well **…** I should stay in case we get a lot of customers. **”**  

 **“** Do you see any customers here? I think we **’** ll be lucky to get one all day, **”** LaF laughed. 

 **“** Well, I should stay just in case, **”** Carmilla insisted. 

Laura tried not to feel insulted. 

Laura failed at not feeling insulted. 

 **“** Why not? Do you not like hanging out? **”** She asked. 

 **“** Are you kidding? **”** LaF said, before Carmilla could reply. **“** I haven **’** t seen Carm this happy since **…”** they trailed off, looking at Carmilla warily. 

 **“** Since what? **”** Laura asked. 

 **“** Since nothing, LaF **’** s just being overdramatic, **”** Carmilla said pointedly, and LaFontaine nodded furiously. 

 **“** Just me, putting my foot in my mouth like I always do, you know, **”** they said, but Laura didn **’** t buy it. 

Something was up with Carmilla, and Laura was going to find out what. 

She spent the rest of the day thinking about it (probably wasn **’** t a good idea to let your mind wander when you were giving someone a permanent and irreversible sleeve tattoo but, you know, whatever.) 

When she finally turned the sign on the door to **‘** closed **’** , she steeled herself before turning around to face Kirsch, who was sitting at his desk with his feet up. 

 **“** So **…** Carmilla says her brother was in the band with you? **”** She winced. That was not a good opening. Kirsch probably didn **’** t want to talk about the band. 

 **“** Uh, yeah, it was me, Will and some guy called Mitchell. Then Will left, then JP joined, then Dennis joined then Mitchell left and now **…”** he laughed, **“** it **’** s a completely different set of people than we started with. **”**

 **“** So you knew her in high school? What was she like? **”** Laura pressed on. A look of recognition crossed Kirsch **’** s face as he realised what the conversation was really about. He kicked his feet off the desk and stood up.

 **“** She was **…** different. Younger I guess. I mean she **’** s a total hottie obviously and probably could **’** ve been one of those popular chicks you always see in movies but she just didn **’** t care about that. She kept herself to herself. I mean, I was in her English class for two years and I never even noticed her! **”**  

Kirsch laughed, so Laura did too, even though there was still more she wanted to know. That didn **’** t explain anything. 

 **“** So what happened? **”**

 **“** I dunno, **”** he shrugged simply. **“** I wasn **’** t friends with her or anything. From what I know, there was some huge shitstorm with her mom right after she graduated and then she disappeared. Next thing I know she **’** s working here. **”**

Laura frowned. That fit with what Carmilla had told her at the concert, but she hadn **’** t mentioned her mom at all. It just wasn **’** t adding up, it felt like there was something important missing. 

And Laura knew exactly where she could find it. 

* * *

 **“** Oh, hey Laura, Carm **’** s already left- **“**

 **“** I know. I figured we could hang out, **”** Laura said as LaF locked up the store. They raised an eyebrow in confusion. 

 **“** Oookay, where? **”** They watched Laura shrug. **“** The pier? **”**

 **“** Sure! **”** Laura hadn **’** t really had time to explore the town, so she had no idea where they were talking about. But she smiled and walked next to LaF as they led her down some stone steps. It was getting dark, the sky lightly tinted with pink, and Laura found herself enjoying the walk down through the street. 

Laura realised that LaF was leading them to the lake. LaF grinned as the plonked themselves down on the wooden pier and dangled their legs over the side. Laura was slightly more careful. The pier seemed to be shifting slightly and she was _not_ in the mood to fall into a lake. Eventually, she managed to sit down with her feet also hovering above the water. 

 **“** So, how **’** s Kevin doing? **”**  

 **“** Great, he learnt a new word this afternoon. **”**

 **“** Really, what? **”**  

 **“** Xanthophyll. **’**  

 **“** Impressive. **”**

 **“** Yeah, they grow up so fast. **”**  

They both laughed at their sheer sarcasm, before LaFontaine **’** s expression became stony. 

 **“** How am I going to sell a two metre tall cactus? **”**

 **“** You don **’** t have to sell him, he **’** s a great mascot! **”**  

 **“** Yeah, **”** they replied unenthusiastically. **“** I guess Perry was right. **”**  

 **“** Who **’** s Perry? **”**

They scratched the back of their neck nervously. **“** She **’** s my ex **…** friend. She _is_ my friend? I don **’** t know. It **’** s complicated. **”**

 **“** Wanna talk about it? **”** Laura offered. In her experience, the best thing she could do sometimes was listen. 

 **“** Well, we both grew up in this town. We were practically inseparable. People said we were an odd pair because she was so clean and tidy and normal and I was messy and disorganised and did science experiments in the backyard. But that **’** s what worked. She would clean up after I inevitably exploded something. **”**  

 **“** So then what happened? **”**  

 **“** I guess I got a little too weird for her. **”**

Laura shot them a questioning look. They turned away, staring at their feet kicking above the lake. 

 **“** Perr likes normal. She likes fitting things into boxed. And I guess when I told her I didn **’** t fit in the box she put me in **…** she freaked. **”**  

Ah. Laura understood. She had to admit that when Carmilla had explained their pronouns, she was slightly confused. Now, she began to feel guilty about that. 

 **“** People do make mistakes- **“**

 **“** I get that, I do. I know it **’** s weird and I **’** m causing problems for people and it **’** s a burden but I **’** d quite like it if my friends could at least pretend it wasn **’** t, you know? You and Carm try to get it right but Perry **…** my best friend since I was five thinks I **’** m some sort of freak. **”**  

 **“** How about for tonight we stuff our faces with popcorn and watch bad scifi? **”** Laura offered. **“** Because I have been banned from Florist Gump by my own immune system **…** and you are fighting with your best friend. **”**  

 **“** I **’** d love to, L, but I **’** ve gotta get back home. Thanks for listening to me, though. I **’** m glad you asked to hang out, **”** they smiled, swinging their legs back onto the pier and standing up, offering a hand to Laura. She took it gratefully, getting to her feet. The sun had almost completely set by this point and it was getting cold. 

 **“** I **’** m glad I asked too, **”** she said, before remembering why she **’** d even asked in the first place. **“** Hey, what happened with Carmilla and her mom? **”**  

 **“** What? **”**

 **“** After she graduated? Kirsch said- **“**

 **“** That **’** s not my place to say. If Carm hasn **’** t told you, you should respect that. See you tomorrow, L. **”**

They shoved their hands into their pockets before spinning on their heel and walking off down the lakeside. 

Laura stood there, thinking about what to do next. She **’** d officially asked everyone she knew who knew Carmilla. All two of them. So now what?

Does she start not just asking about her but actively investigating her own friend, completely disregarding anything like interpersonal boundaries and essentially stalking her?

She started as soon as she got home. 

* * *

Okay, so maybe typing ‘Carmilla Karnstein’ into google was not really the height of investigative journalism, but it was a start. 

What Laura found, however, was a handful of articles from some local German paper about a twelve year old swimmer of the same name. 

Sighing and taking a sup of her red bull, Laura decided she had to be more specific. 

‘Carmilla Karnstein, Styria, Florist Gump.’

And… nothing.

Moving onto Facebook, Laura soon discovered that there were at least three more Carmilla Karnsteins in the world, but the one she cared about seemed to not have an account. Ugh. This was impossible. 

She ran her hand through her hair, leaning back in her desk chair. She was officially stumped and it had been all of ten minutes. 

But damn, Carmilla really didn’t leave any tracks, did she?

Almost everyone in the Western world had Facebook!

And then it hit her. 

If she couldn’t find Carmilla, she could find someone close to her. 

Her fingers flew across the keyboard as she typed in ‘Kirsch’ in a frenzy. When she found the right profile, she allowed herself a small laugh at his first name. She was definitely not going to let him forget her was called Brody. 

There were a few selfies of him at the gym (ew) and a few status’ about random crap, until Laura found what she was looking for.

 

 **Brody Kirsch** shared **Zeta Omega Mu** ’s photo. 

 

Smiling, Laura clicked on the band’s page and _yikes._ They needed better graphic design. 

_Whatever Laura, that’s not what you’re here for._

She scrolled down the page until she found a picture of the band. It was completely ridiculous. They were all leaning against a brick wall, Kirsch in a leather jacket and aviator sunglasses. It was from 2011. 

 _Save as._ You never know what you might need blackmail. 

Laura hovered over the faces to find out who each member was. 

 _Brody Kirsch. JP Armitage. Mitchell Smith._ And… bingo. 

_William Eisen._

_Different last names, that’s interesting. Maybe one of them’s adopted_ Laura thought to herself as she tucked into a cookie. 

She clicked on his name and arrived at his profile. His picture showed an attractive face with pale skin and dark, deep eyes. 

 _Huh, so maybe him and Carmilla_ are _related after all._

His status’ were all about sports and his girlfriend, so Laura scrolled all the way to the bottom. His profile was made in 2010, and his first picture was of a much younger looking, scrawnier kid with a lopsided smile and two front teeth missing. Laura couldn’t help but imagine what that expression would look like on Carmilla’s similar features. 

 

 **William Eisen -** 20th November 2010: _just had an argument w/ millie over the tv >:(_

**3 comments.**

**Elle Harvey:** _im gonna kill u if u call me millie one more time_ \- Carmilla

**William Eisen:** _maybe if u got fb instead of using elle’s u could stop me, millie ;)_

**Elle Harvey:** _and have to deal w/ ur annoying statuses? i’d rather grate my own face off -_ Carmilla

 

Laura had to stifle a laugh at the thought of the angry, punk girl she knew being called ‘Millie’ and arguing with her brother over the television. It seemed so out of character. 

The next post was Christmas that year. More specifically, a picture of three people in front of a large, bright tree. There was Will, and standing next to him was a stern looking woman with gaunt features who was giving a tight-lipped smile. And next to her…

She looked so much younger, and not just because she was shorter and wearing an oversized Christmas sweater that went almost to her knees and covered her hands. 

There was an easy freedom in her features that Laura had never seen before. She was smiling, like _really_ smiling. Not the small smirk she usually gave. It looked like she was about to burst from happiness. 

_What the hell happened between then and now?_

Her eyes were sparkling with a light that had since been extinguished… but not completely. Laura recognised it. She’d seen it briefly when they were dancing. 

She stared longer than she probably should have at teenaged Carmilla. It was surreal. Eventually she managed to tear her eyes away to scroll further up through the years. Early 2011 was boring. A few status’ about the Zetas, some pictures of Will and his friends, but nothing notable. Until 22nd June, where Will uploaded another picture of Carmilla. This one was her and another girl sitting together on a grassy hill. The bright sun was reflecting off her dark hair, and she was wearing shorts, a white tank top and bright pink sunglasses. No black in sight. Her arm was around the girl’s shoulders and they were both laughing at something. 

 

**William Eisen:** _gross, get a room_

**Elle Harvey:** _we’re just close friends!_

**William Eisen:** _i kno that, jeez. no need to get all defensive._

 

Laura recognised that from her time dating Danny in secret. Classic overcompensation. So, Carmilla and Elle were probably secretly together. No big deal. They obviously weren’t anymore, so Laura had no reason to be jealous. But she was. 

She envied Elle for knowing Carmilla when she was younger and happier. Before whatever happened with her mum happened. 

The next status was from September. 

 

 **William Eisen -** 5th September 2011: _can’t believe my big sis is in her senior year!_

**3 comments.**

**Elle Harvey:** _can’t believe my bro’s not a weenie freshman anymore! -_ Carmilla

 **Elle Harvey:** _now you’re a weenie sophomore! -_ Carmilla

**William Eisen:** _I’m not a weenie!!!!!_

 

The only other status even remotely related to Carmilla was from later on in the year, and even then it was just Will lamenting about not being able to go to prom. And then… nothing. It was like she’d just disappeared. Which was exactly what Kirsch had said. But it didn’t make any _sense._

Laura decided to try a new approach. Elle. 

Her profile seemed normal at first. A cover picture of a group of girls sitting around a table at a restaurant. On the left was Carmilla, smiling wide. But she wasn’t looking at the camera. She was looking at Elle. Laura wished Carmilla looked at her that way. 

The profile picture was a selfie and, okay, Elle was kinda super pretty. 

But then Laura realised something was wrong. Because there weren’t any statuses, not for a very long time at least. It was almost exclusively people writing on her wall. 

When Laura read what they were writing, she felt sick.

 

_Heaven has gained a new angel. RIP lovely girl xxx_

 


	11. Chapter 11

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> im really sorry this took so long but tbh it would have taken even longer without the fabulous help of my friend anna who pretty much saved my life on this one  
> also warning, this one is the one where everything goes to shit

Laura wasn’t answering her phone. She’d sent fifteen text messages, and Laura hadn’t responded to any of them. She’d left four voicemails, each one more frantic than the last. 

“Laura, seriously, why are you not answering your phone?! _Laura please call me back I’m freaking out right now, where are you?!”_

Carmilla hung up the phone with shaking hands. She was finding it hard to breathe and she could feel tears beginning to form in her eyes. 

She’d been round to Colour Me Cute, but it was closed because it was Sunday. She’d knocked madly on Laura’s apartment door, but there was no answer. Kirsch didn’t know where she was either. 

And although every logical part of Carmilla’s brain was telling her that everything was fine and there was no reason to panic, all she could think was _this is just like last time._

_This is just like Elle._

She quickly pushed the thought out of her mind, pacing back and forth in her bedroom and running her hand furiously through her hair. In a panic, she sent a few more text messages. 

 

carmcussion: okay seriously i’m kinda freaking out where the fuck are you????

carmcussion: LAURA

carmcussion: please please please be okay

 

This was far too close to what had happened with Elle. The disappearance, her not answering her phone. And if it ended the same way…

Carmilla took a few deep breaths to calm herself, but it wasn’t working. She was sucking in more and more air but not exhaling, and before she knew it she was hyperventilating. 

This hadn’t happened in months. 

Quickly, she called LaFontaine. She couldn’t manage anything more than some rattled gasping, but they understood perfectly. They were bursting into her apartment within ten minutes. 

They found her curled up on the floor, struggling to breathe. 

“Okay, Carm, it’s okay, I’m here,” they said, stroking her hair soothingly. Carmilla found the touch comforting, but she still couldn’t breathe. Her thoughts kept imagining Laura’s body in some dark alleyway somewhere. Imagining the phone call telling Carmilla she was dead. Imagining her life having lost someone else she cared about. 

 Slowly, Carmilla managed to take a few deep breaths and the spots in front of her eyes disappeared. She sat up slowly, leaning against the bed. 

“You okay?” LaF asked, their eyes concerned. 

“L-Laura’s not answering her phone. Or her texts. I just… this is just like…” 

“Hey,” LaF put a comforting arm around her shoulders, “I’m sure she’s fine. This isn’t like Elle. She’ll be okay.” 

“I know you’re right but I just,” Carmilla sniffed, “I’m scared.” 

“I know, I know.” 

They sat like that, Carmilla catching her breath, shaking a little bit when she breathed out. LaFontaine had helped her with enough of these attacks by now to know exactly what she needed. 

She didn’t need space. She needed assurance. 

“Do you want me to stay here for a while?” LaF asked. 

“No, it’s fine, I was just being stupid.” 

“Hey, it’s not being stupid. We don’t apologise for how we feel.” 

“Thanks, LaF.”

“No problem. What are friends for?” 

* * *

Laura was there. She was standing on the landing between their doors, with a backpack slung over one shoulder. 

Carmilla stood for a moment. There were so many things she wanted to say. ‘I’m so glad you’re okay.’ ‘You had me really worried.’ ‘I love you.’ 

“Where the fuck have you been?!” _Great going, brain. That’s really a great choice!_

“I was at my dad’s,” Laura said. 

“You weren’t answering your texts or your calls.”

“I left my phone at home, I’m sorry,” Laura said. 

“You had me terrified something had happened to you!” Carmilla yelled. She wasn’t sure why she was yelling. 

“Well I’m fine!” Laura said. 

“You can’t just disappear without telling me!”

“Yes I can! I’m a grown up, despite how everyone seems to treat me!”

“I know that, but I just thought-“

“You know I’m not Elle, right?” 

“What?” Nononono this wasn’t good. Laura wasn’t _ever_ meant to find out about her. If she knew about Elle, she knew about Carmilla. What she’d done. How she’d destroyed the best thing about her life. And if Laura knew… she wouldn’t want to stick around. Carmilla was panicking, but as always it came out as anger. “How the fuck do you know about her? Did LaF say something-“

“No no they didn’t tell me anything. I found out myself,” Laura said, and Carmilla felt her legs go weak underneath her.

“Look, I don’t know how you found out about Elle but you had no right! You cant just dig into peoples pasts without their permission!” She was truly panicking now. How much did Laura know about Elle? How much did she know about what Carmilla had done? 

“I just wanted to help-“ Laura said defensively. 

“I don’t need your help!” Once again Carmilla’s mouth said the exact opposite of the truth. But she had to keep Laura away. Before she found out about the rest of it. “You’re a child and you understand nothing! You think everyone lives in a wonderful fantasy world where nothing bad ever happens! I have a newsflash for you, sweetheart, we haven’t all grown up with a perfect life like yours!”

“You think my life is perfect?!’ Laura seemed angry, and Carmilla wanted to punch herself. She’d managed to fuck this up. “You think you’re the only person in the world who’s ever lost someone?”

“What are you-“

“Carmilla _my mom is dead_. And I practically killed her.”

Carmilla felt like she’d been stabbed in the gut. At the same time, she had the urge to _literally_ stab herself in the gut. Why couldn’t she talk to anyone without messing everything up? 

“I left a candle lit when I left the house a few years back. I got a call saying she was in hospital and she…she didn’t make it. So don’t you _dare_ say I don’t understand loss.”

“I didn’t-“

Laura blew out air, seeming to lose her fight. “I know that.”

"I can't believe I...I'm so sorry.”

"You don't have to apologize"

"Yes I-“

"I know I pushed too far, but I care about you and you keep pushing me away when I get too close. Why? Don’t you like me?”

Now that was the most ridiculous thing Carmilla had ever heard. She would have laughed if her whole life hadn’t been collapsing around her. 

“Of course I like you Laura-“

“Then what is it?” her eyes were wide questioning. Carmilla couldn’t bring herself to let Laura think she didn’t like her. She deserved the truth. Carmilla took a deep breath, steeling herself. She just had to say it. 

“I don’t like you the way you like me, okay? And every time we spend time together it gets harder and harder distinguish between just friends and something more.”

There. It was said. 

Carmilla avoided Laura’s eyes, but when she didn’t say anything, Carmilla looked up to see an expression on Laura’s face that broke her heart. 

“Oh. I guess I’ll stay out of your way to avoid the confusion then.” 

And with that, Laura opened her front door and walked out, leaving Carmilla standing on the landing feeling worse than she had ever felt before. 

* * *

“Hey, have you heard from Laura?”

“Go away!” 

“Carm, come on!” 

“No, LaF, leave me alone!” 

“I’m not leaving, so if you don’t get out of bed I’ll eat all your cookies!” 

Carmilla groaned, throwing back the covers and getting out of her bed. She padded over to her bedroom door, and opened it to find LaFontaine leaning on her hallway wall with their arms crossed. 

“Remind me to ask for my keys back from you.” 

“No chance!” they grinned, “anyway, have you heard from her?” 

“Yeah.” 

“That doesn’t sound very happy. Is she okay?” 

“Yeah she’s fine. Forgot her phone. Oh, and she knows all about Elle, and never wants to see me ever again because I practically confessed my love for her and she doesn’t feel the same way,” Carmilla said in a bitter tone, walking past LaFontaine and getting a beer from the fridge. 

“Yikes. I’m sorry, bro.” 

“It’s alright.” The words were somewhat negated by the fact that they were followed by a swig of beer at 4pm on a Sunday. 

“Well, uh, if you want we could go down to the store? You could let your feelings out on Kevin for a little bit? It’s pretty therapeutic.” 

“You’re alright, LaF. I’m not really in the mood to have circle time with a cactus.” 

“Don’t knock it till you try it!” 

“Ugh, _fine.”_

LaF held the door open for Carmilla, who quickly crossed the landing without looking to Laura’s door, which remained as shut as ever. 

They walked down the stone steps, and out onto the street. It was only a couple steps to the florists, so Carmilla didn’t care that she was still wearing her pyjamas. Who cares? She felt shitty, so it only made sense that she looked shitty too. 

However, LaF didn’t open the door when they got there. They just stood there. 

“What is it?” Carmilla said.

LaFontaine turned around, and pointed to the door with wide eyes. 

Stuck to the front door was a bright red poster. 

 

**Notice of Liquidation.**

 


	12. Chapter 12

“So, honey, how’ve the first few weeks been?” Laura's dad said over a cup of coffee. His feet were up on the coffee table and Laura realised that since she'd moved out he'd hardly changed the living room at all. Her books were still in the bookshelf, and cards from her last birthday were still on the mantlepiece. 

Then again, it had been three years since her mother's death and Laura still insisted he kept her shoes in the hall, so she couldn't really blame him.

“Uh, really great!” she answered. Even though it had just been the two of them living there for years, the house felt eerily empty. Laura didn't want to think about how lonely it must be when she wasn't there. 

“Maybe one day I can stop by and you can give me something really cool? I could become a biker dad,” he joked.

“Oh my god, please tell me you're kidding!”

“Definitely not. I am going to get a tattoo of a motorcycle on fire in the middle of my back and start asking people to call me 'Spike’,” he deadpanned.

“If you're not joking,” Laura said, walking through to the kitchen to grab another grape soda, “please know I will no longer acknowledge that we're related.

“Of course I'm joking. Do you know how dangerous motorcycle gangs are?”  
“No, dad.”

“I deal with them daily. Just last week someone got stabbed.”

“Yeesh.”

“I know right?”

They both laughed as Laura sat back down on the couch. She'd missed this. Living alone was fun and she _had_ always wanted her independence, but sometimes a girl needed to be with her dad, you know?

“I’m really proud of you, kiddo. And I know she would be too.”

Laura didn't need to ask who he was talking about. She fought back the inevitable tears that always came whenever she thought about her mom. Tears, and guilt.

Her dad had said he didn't blame her, but she knew he did just a little bit. Who wouldn't? It was entirely Laura's fault that the candle stayed lit, and that it caught fire to the curtains.

It was her fault, no matter how many other people tried to tell her it wasn't.

Moving to her own place, making her own friends, was a fresh start. Kirsch didn’t know, and neither did LaFontaine. And thank god Carmilla didn’t either. Laura wasn’t sure how Carmilla would be able to look her in the eyes if she knew what had happened.

“You know I think Danny is working today. You could go see her at the bank?”

Laura sighed. Of course Danny would come up in conversation. “No, Dad. I don't really want to talk to her right now.”

“Why not? What the hell happened between you two?”

“It’s a long story,” she avoided her dad’s gaze, suddenly becoming very interested in her fingernails. She wasn’t ready for this conversation. She probably wasn’t ever going to be ready for it.

Not only would it lead to her having to come out to her dad, but it also meant talking about Danny, which was painful enough in itself. Laura still felt awful when she thought about it. She wasn’t sure if it was sadness or anger or embarrassment but, whatever it was, it wasn’t fun.

“Honey, you should try and make up-“

“No! Okay, I don’t want to make out with her!”

“What?”

“Up! I said I don’t want to make _up_ with her!”

Her dad raised his eyebrow, then sipped his coffee. Laura knew he probably knew. But she also knew he wouldn’t bring it up and would let her tell him in her own time. Which she appreciated, but _god_ it was difficult. It would be way easier if he just came out and asked her.

But he was way too decent a person to do that.

“Look, even if you two girls can’t go back to being… as close as you were before… there’s no harm in at least trying to become acquaintances again. I know you’re a very forgiving girl.”

Laura smiled. In her mind she’d already forgiven Danny. She just wasn’t sure Danny had forgiven her.

“I know. I’ll call her.”

* * *

“Where the fuck have you been?!” Carmilla was angry. She was shaking. Laura had never seen her like this.

“I was at my dad’s,” Laura said.

“You weren’t answering your texts or your calls."

“I left my phone at home, I’m sorry.”

“You had me terrified something had happened to you!” Carmilla raised her voice. Laura was completely disoriented. Where had this come from?

“Well I’m fine!”

“You can’t just disappear without telling me!”

“Yes I can! I’m a grown up, despite how everyone seems to treat me!” Laura said. Her dad, Danny, and now apparently Carmilla. Why couldn’t anybody treat her like an adult?

Carmilla sighed. “I know that, but I just thought-“

“You know I’m not Elle, right?”  

“What?” Carmilla’s eyes widened in horror and Laura immediately wanted to pull the words back into her mouth. But it was said. “How the fuck do you know about her?” She was dangerously pale, more than usual. “Did LaF say something-“

“No no they didn’t tell me anything. I found out myself,” Laura said, panicking. This was not what was meant to happen.

“Look, I don’t know how you found out about Elle but you had no right! You cant just dig into peoples pasts without their permission!”

“I just wanted to help-“

“I don’t need your help!” Her eyes were dark, and cold, and Laura felt like the part of her that had slowly been healing since she met Carmilla was being ripped open again. “You’re a child and you understand nothing! You think everyone lives in a wonderful fantasy world where nothing bad ever happens! I have a newsflash for you, sweetheart, we haven’t all grown up with a perfect life like yours!”

“You think my life is perfect?!’ Laura said, emotion building up inside her. She knew she was about to say something she’d regret, but she couldn’t stop herself. “You think you’re the only person in the world who’s ever lost someone?”

“What are you-“

“Carmilla  _my mom is dead._ And I practically killed her.”

That seemed to knock the fight out of Carmilla. She visibly slumped, but kept her jaw locked in place. Laura took a deep breath. She felt completely and utterly awful, using her mom’s death as leverage in an argument. She felt even worse reliving the moment, but she was unable to stop talking.  

“I left a candle lit when I left the house a few years back. I got a call saying she was in hospital and she…she didn’t make it. So don’t you  _dare_  say I don’t understand loss.”

“I didn’t-“

“I know that,” Laura said trying to calm the situation.

"I can't believe I...I'm so sorry,” Carmilla said, and Laura felt even worse. They hadn’t even been arguing about her mom, yet she’d dragged her into it. And she knew that Carmilla understood, with whatever had happened to Elle.

"You don't have to apologize"

"Yes I-“

"I know I pushed too far, but I care about you and you keep pushing me away when I get too close. Why? Don’t you like me?” Laura said, looking up at Carmilla with wide eyes. She could feel her heart thumping in her chest at the answer.  
“Of course I like you Laura-“

“Then what is it?”

Carmilla sucked in air, seemingly bracing herself. Laura didn’t take that as a good sign.

“I don’t like you the way you like me, okay? And every time we spend time together it gets harder and harder distinguish between just friends and something more.”

Laura stood on the landing feeling like the world was falling apart beneath her. Carmilla didn’t like her the same way.

Oh.

“Oh. I guess I’ll stay out of your way to avoid the confusion then.” 

Before Carmilla could see the tears that had begun forming, Laura opened her door and walked into her apartment. She leaned against the doorframe and allowed herself to cry.

* * *

Laura stared at the ceiling.

She wasn’t exactly sure when she’d ended up on the floor with Danny’s mixtape playing, but something about the blank whiteness of the ceiling helped her to think. Or rather, it helped her to _not_ think.

She blocked out all of her thoughts about Danny, and Carmilla, and her mother.

She just lay there and stared.

Her knees were bent, feet flat on the floor, and Ed Sheeran was playing softly from the CD player. Laura felt calmer than she had in a while.

So, Carmilla didn’t like her romantically. And she wanted to spend less time together because they were getting too close. That was fine.

So, Danny had broken up with her because she was ‘annoying’ and ‘a child’ who ‘got everyone into trouble’. Also fine.

Everything was fine.

As long as Laura didn’t think about it too hard.

She sat up. She needed to stay busy. Standing up, she paused the music and took out her phone.

Two rings. Not enough time for Laura to decide this was probably a bad idea.

“Hello?”

“Uh, hey, Danny. It’s me.”

 


	13. Chapter 13

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> things are said that tbh you've probably been waiting for  
> also known as the chapter that will very possibly kill someone

The alarm woke Carmilla with a jolt. 

“Shit.”

She rolled over and pressed the button on her phone, silencing it. Sitting up and rubbing the sleep out of her eyes, Carmilla cursed multiple things. 

She cursed mornings. She cursed the fact that she didn’t get any sleep last night. She cursed the bar she’d been in last night for serving drinks until two in the morning. She cursed her job. Not for any particular reason, she just fucking hated it. And she cursed her boss, who was a lot less understanding than her previous one, and probably wouldn’t tolerate her being late. 

She shuffled around the room, picking up some clothes and putting them on slowly. Pretty much everything she wore was black anyway, so getting dressed in the dark was never really an issue. 

The stairs creaked as she padded down them, and she winced. Luckily, no one seemed to wake up.

When she reached the kitchen, she saw a figure standing there, pouring a glass of water. 

“Hey, what are you doing up?”

“Well _someone_ woke me up a few hours ago with her drunken singing. I figured there was no point trying to get back to sleep,” Will replied. 

“Yikes. Sorry about that,” she grimaced. 

“It’s alright. Natalie’s still asleep,” he handed another glass of water to Carmilla, who took it gratefully. “You know, I should probably tell Mother you’re here.” 

Carmilla barked out a laugh. “No chance. She’d force me to leave, and probably douse you in holy water for letting me in your home.” 

“You know she’s not that bad.”

“She killed Elle!” Carmilla burst out, before realising that she probably woke up Natalie. Ah well. If she had to get up at this ungodly hour then so did everyone else. 

Will smiled sympathetically. “No, she didn’t. You know who killed Elle? The guy that pulled the trigger. Not our mom, not _her_ mom… and not you.”

Carmilla scoffed. “I don’t-“

“Not you,” Will said with a finality that indicated he wouldn’t be argued with. He tilted his head slightly, before turning around and heading back upstairs. 

This was why Carmilla hated staying with Will. (Well, one of the reasons. There was always the loss of her dignity, having to rely on her baby brother because her foray into the adult world had left her jobless and homeless.) He always seemed to know exactly what was going on in her mind, which was unnerving. She’d become quite accustomed to being an unreadable mystery to most people. 

Sighing and finishing her water, she picked up her bag and headed out the door. It was bright, which was not a good thing. Even though it was pretty cold, the harsh sunlight gave Carmilla a headache and she struggled to keep her eyes open. 

She put on a pair of sunglasses as she walked to the bus stop, hoping that it gave her more of a cool vibe than a ‘I’m super hungover and pissed off’ vibe. Although, as long as it kept people from talking to her, she didn’t really mind. 

The bus was late, which gave Carmilla just enough time to curse the weather, young children who made obscene amounts of noise early in the morning, and public transportation as a concept. 

“The Lustig Mall,” she mumbled, handing over her change before the bus driver could even tell her how much it was. She knew. She’d been getting the same bus every morning for three damn weeks. 

Thankfully, the bus was pretty empty. She found herself a seat at the back and leaned her head against the cool window. 

As the bus drove along the high street, Carmilla averted her gaze. She didn’t want to see a certain thriving tattoo parlour, and she _definitely_ didn’t want to see the empty shell next to it. They hadn’t even turned the space into anything else yet, so it was just sitting there looking derelict, reminding Carmilla of yet another decent thing in her life that she’d fucked up. 

Come to think of it, the tattoo parlour had a similar effect. 

When the bus went past and Carmilla could no longer see the two shops, she let out a sigh of relief. That was definitely not getting easier. 

The ride to the mall was boring and the scenery certainly wasn’t much entertainment. There were buildings. Some fields. Oh look, more buildings. 

Thrilling. 

When the bus ground to a noisy halt, Carmilla strolled off, giving a quick ‘thanks’ to the driver. She stared at the ugly architecture of the daily reminder that she was bound to a capitalist and materialistic society. 

“Show time,” she mumbled, before walking in to start the day. 

* * *

The Disney store sucked.

Carmilla had hated customer service enough when it was in Florist Gump, but at least that florist never had more than two people in it at a time, and they were hardly ever under the age of thirty five. 

In her new job, she had to deal with _children._

Not that Carmilla actually minded little kids when they were on their own. They reminded her of Will from a few years ago, back before everything had gone wrong. 

But when you get twenty of them in a small enclosed space, and added a bunch of toys into the mix… eurgh. 

“No, honey, that toy is for girls. How about a Buzz Lightyear?”

Carmilla looked around for the source of that complete bullshit. Her eyes fell on a young boy clutching an Elsa doll. His bottom lip was wobbling as his mother tried to pull the toy from his grasp. 

“But I don’t _want_ Buzz Lightyear. Elsa is _cool.”_

“Elsa is for _girls._ You’re a boy, honey. So we could get you some cars, or an Iron Man…” 

Carmilla rolled her eyes, stepping out from behind the counter and approaching the lady. 

“Uh, hi,” the plastered on her best ‘Disney-grin’, “you know these toys have no gender. Your son can play with whatever he-“

“Don’t tell me how to raise my kid,” she snapped, before snatching the plastic Elsa away from the boy, who burst into tears. Carmilla felt rage bubble up inside her, but she pushed it down. She couldn’t yell at customer like she could in her old job. She was expected to be perpetually cheery. 

Carmilla would have doubted all that happiness was possible had she not known a certain ball of 24/7 sunshine. Who was probably _still_ happy, what with how successful Colour Me Cute seemed to be doing and all. Not that Carmilla was paying attention or anything. 

Picturing Laura’s goofy smiled helped Carmilla to calm down, and she flashed the woman a smile.

“My apologies. If you want I could show you our Avengers toys…”

A few minutes later, when the woman swept out of the shop, leaving her gloomy son to carry a Captain America toy, Carmilla leaned down and slipped an Elsa sticker into his hand. 

“Sssh,” she put a finger to her lips, “don’t tell your mom, okay?” 

He grinned wide and nodded, before running off behind his mother. 

Carmilla smiled. Of course that sticker would come out of her pay check, but she was sure she could manage to spare two dollars if it made the kid so damn happy. 

* * *

the lafon-brain: DUDE i have something important to tell you!

broody mc-grump pants: I’m at work. 

the lafon-brain: well when do you get off? because you will NOT believe this!

* * *

Carmilla hated malls. They reminded her of how tiny and insignificant they all were, and not in the good way. People running around, arguing over arbitrary items of clothing as if it would change the fact that they’re all gonna die eventually. 

She shifted on her plastic bench. LaF was meant to be here already. There was nothing to do and this public a space made Carmilla nervous. 

LaFontaine rushed up to her, dropping their bag on the floor and sitting next to her on the bench in a flurry. 

“Are you gonna tell me what all this is about?” 

“Okay so I have bad news and _really really great news!_ ” they seemed out of breath but smiled widely. Slowly, though, the smile slid off their face, “actually, on second thought, it _would_ have been good news a few months ago. Now it’s probably just salt in the wound. So I guess I have bad news and _more_ bad news.” 

“Just get to the point,” Carmilla crossed her arms and leaned against the grey wall of the mall. 

“Okay okay okay, _so._ I ran into Laura-“

“Oh great,” Carmilla pushed her hair out of her face, “what’s the other bit of news?”

“Oh no, that was neither of the bits of news. So, yeah, I ran into Laura at the university.”

“Why was she there?” 

“Well, that’s what I’m trying to tell you! She was there to visit Danny.” 

“Fuck.” 

“No wait it gets better. So I was on my lunch break, talking to Professor Leda about my biochemistry, right? Because obviously I entered the course late on in the semester so I had to catch up, and then the next thing I know I’m being hugged by this tiny person…”

Carmilla couldn’t help but laugh. That sounded like Laura all right. Good to know she hadn’t changed. 

“And she asked me how I was doing, and I explained about starting to get my degree and then she asked how you were doing-“

“What did you say?” Carmilla asked. She felt a small leap in her chest at the thought that Laura still asked about her, even after everything that had happened. 

“Don’t worry, I said you found a new, totally cool, job in some record shop now _stop interrupting._ So I said goodbye to Prof. Leda and me and Laura went out for lunch, and I asked why she was there, and she said her friend was a Lit TA. So I asked her who, and she said Danny. So at this point I was reacting pretty much the same way you are, but then she waved Danny over to us from the queue.”

“Is there a point to this story other than just to make me feel awful?” Carmilla sighed. 

“Yes! Because dude, Danny? _Is a girl.”_

“What?!” Carmilla bolted up onto her feet in complete surprise. 

“Yeah man, you heard me.” 

“Fuck!” 

“I know, right?” LaF also stood up, “you’re a silly noodle,” they smiled and patted Carmilla on the shoulder. 

Carmilla felt like an absolute idiot. Danny is a girl. Laura likes girls. 

Laura could have liked _her._

_Fuck._

“I fucked up. Oh my god I fucked up,” Carmilla said, completely ignoring all of the small children and families who were milling about the mall. “What do I do? Fuck. Even if she did like me, now she’s back with Danny-“

“Oh no, dude, don’t worry. Her and Danny are just friends. Unless they’ve got some polyamory thing going on.” 

“What do you mean?”

“Well after we all had lunch together, Danny left to go and get ready for a date, and Laura wished her good luck.”

“Fuck fuck fuck fuck,” Carmilla started pacing, “I need to go and explain it all to her. I need to go right now-“

“Wait!” LaF grabbed her by the arm before she could run off. “I have something that could help.” 

* * *

“Flowers? Seriously? After everything?” Carmilla raised an eyebrow and stared at LaFontaine, who was holding a bouquet of roses with a proud expression on their face. Why they had to drag Carmilla all the way to their bio lab to show her _flowers,_ she still wasn’t sure. 

“Not just any flowers. This is what I’ve been working on! These are completely, one hundred percent, hypoallergenic. No hay fever. No Laura sneezes.”

“Dude, that’s awesome!” Carmilla grinned, taking the flowers from LaF. Now she understood. “Wait, you’ve been spending all this time at university chemically enhancing flowers? After finally being freed from your mom’s old store?”

LaF shrugged, “old habits die hard, I guess. I mean you were planning on travelling the world but instead you’re still in retail.” 

“Touche.” 

“Now, go and apologise to that girl for being a complete goober!” LaF said before grabbing hold of Carmilla by the shoulders and steering her out of the bio lab. The door slammed behind her, and Carmilla stood for a moment, clutching the roses, before exhaling and walking off towards the bus stop.

* * *

“Okay, Carmilla, you can do this,” Carmilla murmured to herself, staring at the door. “It’s just a door. You’ve seen it a thousand times. Heck, you used to _live_ next to it! Just knock on the door.” 

She raised a fist, “three… two… one.” 

Her hand stayed still. 

“Come on! You can knock on the door! You’ve done all this shit to prepare, you’re not gonna be defeated by a fucking door-“

“Uh, Carm?” 

Carmilla whirled around, to find Laura standing on the landing, holding a grocery bag. Her eyebrows shot up in surprise, “what’s going on? What are you wearing?” 

“Well… I, uh,” Carmilla felt herself going red as she spluttered. Although she’d talked herself through this moment multiple times, she still wasn’t prepared to finally be faced with Laura, who seemed to have somehow gotten even more beautiful over the months they’d been apart. “I guess in my mind this was some big romantic gesture. You know, like in those awful movies you like so much.” She refused to meet Laura’s gaze, staring at her shoes. On second thought, the suit may have been a tad too much. But she wanted to do this right. 

“A big romantic…?” Laura shook her head, laying the bag down on the ground and crossing her arms. “What are you talking about?”

“Okay, so…” Carmilla closed her eyes, trying to remember the speech she’d written in her head, “I was kinda a complete asshole. In my defence, there were some communication errors and I thought _you_ were being a complete asshole. But that was also my fault.”

She cracked her eyes open to check Laura’s reaction. Her arms were still crossed, but a small smile tugged at the corners of her mouth. Carmilla took that as her cue to keep going. 

“When I said I didn’t like you the same way you liked me, that was because I thought you liked me as a friend, and I liked you as,” her blood was thundering around her ears now, “something more. But I understand now that my phrasing was extremely vague and was very easy to misinterpret.”

“You thought I only liked you as a friend?” Laura said, a small laugh in her voice, “seriously? I’m pretty much the least subtle person ever.” 

“In my defence, I thought you were straight!”

Now that comment had Laura properly laughing, loud and beautifully. She was literally doubled over, clutching her sides. Carmilla felt herself blush again, as bright as the bouquet she was holding. 

“Well it’s not my fault you dated someone with a gender-neutral name!” 

Laura eventually managed to get her laughing out of control, just enough to wheeze out, “wait a minute, you thought Danny was…?” She began laughing again. 

“Yes, yes, I get it. Let’s all laugh at me being a complete imbecile.” 

Laura calmed herself down, before taking a step towards Carmilla. 

“Yeah, you are,” she was smiling, though, so Carmilla found herself smiling too, “first off you assumed someone’s gender from their name and the fact they like sports, which I’m sure LaF wouldn’t appreciate, not to mention that it’s conforming to traditional societal gender roles. _And_ then you assumed that because I had dated a male in the past that I was straight! First off, a lot of lesbians date men before they realise their identity, plus I may not have been lesbian in the first place. Sexuality is a spectrum and you just erased everything in between the dichotomy of gay and straight, which is biphobic and panphobic and acephobic-“

“And you’re _really_ attractive when you talk about this stuff.” 

Laura just smiled, before taking another step even closer. 

“And you are adorable,” she whispered, before grabbing hold of Carmilla by the lapels and pulling her down for a kiss. Carmilla felt like all the air was knocked out of her, but at the same time she felt full. As if everything that had happened over the past few months had been building up and this was what she had been waiting for. Her lungs were in shock, but she was breathing in _Laura_ , so who needed air, really?

They pulled apart, just long enough to allow Laura to smile and… holy shit did she just _giggle?_

Carmilla captured her for another kiss because, _wow_ that giggle was adorable and she wanted to make it happen again. She wasn’t sure quite what to do with her hands, because in her right hand she was still holding the bouquet. So she settled for tangling her left in Laura’s hair, and letting her right fall to her side. 

“So…” Carmilla said when Laura finally pulled away, “what does this mean?” 

“It means that I’ve wanted to do that for a very long time,” Laura said, running her hands down Carmilla’s arms. 

“Well yeah but… are we cool now?” 

“Carmilla, you do realise my tongue has been _in_ your mouth, right? I’m pretty sure we’re cool now.”

Carmilla felt her entire body relax in relief. She hadn’t realised how tense she’d been ever since her and Laura argued, but all of a sudden it was gone, and she felt like she could fly around the world. 

Or maybe that was because, as Laura had so eloquently put it, _she’d just had Laura Hollis’ tongue in her mouth._

“Uh, I also got you these,” Carmilla said, awkwardly holding out the flowers between them. 

“Carmilla! They’re gorgeous, but you know I’m allergic-“

“Oh, no, don’t worry. LaF did some science shit on them so they don’t make you sneezy. Totally safe.” 

“You got me chemically engineered flowers? And they say romance is dead.” 

 


	14. Chapter 14

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> this is technically the last chapter but there will be an epilogue and it will be ADORABLE AND GROSS AND ALL THAT STUFF SO  
> oooh also!!!! sorry about the wait school has been getting VERY intense plus i had rehearsals for like nine hours a day but... yeah  
> and thank you so so much for all your kudos and lovely reviews! i honestly feel so so happy that you're al enjoying this fic as much as i enjoy writing it!

“So, we need to talk,” Laura said, setting her groceries on the countertop. She turned around to find Carmilla a lot closer than she was expecting, and she felt her breath catch in her throat slightly. 

“We could talk,” Carmilla’s eyes flicked down to Laura’s lips, “or…” 

“Or we could _talk,”_ Laura said firmly, mustering all of her self-control and walking away from Carmilla. She sat herself down on the couch and gestured for Carmilla to join her. 

The other girl groaned and sat down next to Laura on the couch, putting her feet up on the coffee table. 

“So…”

“So.” 

Laura realised that she should probably actually say something. They hadn’t seen each other in months, there was a lot to say and Laura wasn’t sure where to start. 

At the same time, she kind of wanted to skip all the talking and go back to kissing Carmilla. 

“I’m sorry.” 

_There we go. Begin with the obvious._

“What for?”

“For digging around in your past. LaF warned me, I should have listened to them. If you wanted me to know, you would have told me. I’m sorry.” 

“Apology accepted,” Carmilla said, offering a small smile to Laura. “How much did you find out?”

“Just that you two were close in high school. And she died.” 

Carmilla seemed to visibly relax at that. 

“Oh, good,” she sighed out. “I thought you found out about the rest of it from some untrustworthy lackwit. I kind of panicked.”

“I noticed,” Laura snorted. Then she realised Carmilla’s face was serious.

“Look, I’m only telling you this because I don’t want you to hear some twisted version of the truth from Kirsch or LaF or,” her nose wrinkled in disgust, “my _family._ So buckle up, creampuff. We’re in for a long night. Or, you know, Wednesday afternoon.” 

* * *

“Me and Elle were best friends ever since we were kids. We were even born in the same hospital room, three hours apart. People used to say we didn’t even have a choice, we were born to be friends,” she smiled slightly at the memory, “but even if that wasn’t true, I would have chosen her. No matter what, I would always have chosen her. As we grew older, we became closer. Inseparable. Eventually we both realised that our feelings went past the platonic. I still remember our first kiss.” 

She was smiling, but Laura could tell that her words were tinged with sorrow. She took the other girl’s hand, and Carmilla gave her a grateful look. 

“Anyway, we grew up in a small town. You know what that’s like. People aren’t the most… accepting. Our parents included. So we decided we’d keep it a secret. Everyone knew how close we were anyway, so who cared if we had to kiss behind closed doors? That was only a tiny fraction of our relationship. We thought we could manage it.” 

Laura winced. That sounded an awfully lot like her and Danny. 

“And we did. For years we were together. We helped each other, whenever our parents were being shitty. I’d call her or she’d call me and we’d make some excuse to get out of the house. We made plans. After graduation we were going to leave this hellhole, make a life for ourselves together somewhere completely new, our families be damned. It was comforting to have someone who understood, I guess. Someone constant. Except…” she took a deep breath, “I got cocky. No, that’s not the right word. I got… naive. I believed that maybe my mother would be more understanding, after all, she loved me and she loved Elle like a daughter. I told her.”

There was a pause and Laura could sense the tension in the air. Still, she figured it would be better if she just stayed silent and allowed Carmilla time to get it straight in her head. When she next spoke, her voice was shaky.

“She… wasn’t very understanding. She kicked me out, told me she didn’t want me anywhere near Will. And when I turned to him, pleading, he just stared coldly and said nothing. He was only fourteen, and he turned his back on me. Anyway, I, uh, went over to Elle’s like I always did. I thought maybe we could just run away then, begin our new life. But when I got there… my mom had called her mom. And they weren’t happy. She opened the door with a face half-bruised.” 

Laura couldn’t help the whisper that escaped her, “ _shit.”_

“You’re telling me,” Carmilla laughed, with very little humour. “She found out it was me that told. And she understandably wanted nothing to do with me. So I left by myself. I had enough money for just one bus ticket, and I left. But I couldn’t help but feel like we couldn’t end it that way. She believed I was a monster, and I _know_ that I caused all that shit to happen to her but… I just wanted her to know I was sorry. I tried calling her but she wouldn’t answer.

“I lived on the streets for a while. Just a few weeks, don’t worry. But it was tough. Then one day, I ran into LaFontaine. I hadn’t seen them in ages, but they were so _kind._ They offered me a meal, then when I explained everything they offered me a job. Just like that. And a place to stay. I’ll never repay them for that.

“I worked in the florists for a few months before I got the news. It was in the paper. The _fucking_ paper. Not a phone call, not anybody telling me. I had to find out by reading a newspaper article titled ‘Young Woman Found Stabbed.’ Turns out her parents had kicked her out to, but she hadn’t wanted to go with me. She made her own way, and she was on the streets way longer than I was. And she got jumped-“ Carmilla couldn’t finish as she was now choked with sobs. 

“Hey, hey,” Laura pulled Carmilla in to a hug, stroking her hair, “it’s okay. I’m here.” She could feel Carmilla crying into the crook of her neck, and she just continued whispering soothing words, until Carmilla seemed to calm down a little. She pulled away, wiping away tears. 

“I’m sorry, I don’t usually cry on the first date,” she sniffed. 

“That’s fine,” Laura smiled slightly. “I don’t usually make hot cocoa on the first date, but I guess we’re making exceptions today, huh?” 

Carmilla nodded slightly and gave a watery smile. Laura jumped off the couch and rifled through her grocery bags. 

“Good thing I just went shopping, huh?” 

As she was boiling the kettle, she heard Carmilla get off the couch and walk up next to her, taking her hand. 

“So… this was a date,” Laura said.  

“Next time, why don’t we just catch a movie?” 

* * *

Laura was almost falling asleep. She was trying to concentrate on the movie, but it was boring and Carmilla was _really_ comfortable to cuddle. 

“Are you sleepy, cutie?” 

“What?” Laura mumbled, “No. Definitely not.” 

Carmilla laughed and Laura could feel the vibrations. “Sure.” 

Just then, Carmilla’s phone buzzed. She sighed, and picked it up. 

“It’s LaFontaine. They want to know how it all went.” 

“How what went?” Laura asked. 

“Oh, I dunno, maybe that _whole elaborate romantic gesture I did._ Or… attempted to do. I had a speech but to be honest I kind of forgot it the moment I saw you standing there.” 

“So…”

“So?”

“What are you telling them? How did it go?” 

“I’d say pretty well,” Carmilla smiled down at her. 

“I think so too.” 

They looked at each other for a moment, before Laura pulled Carmilla down for another kiss. She didn’t think she’d ever get tired of being able to do that. When she pulled back Carmilla took a few seconds to flutter her eyes open. 

“Let’s change that to _very_ well.” 

“Why don’t you call them?” 

“Seriously?” Carmilla raised her eyebrows. “That would mean pausing this movie and I know how _extremely invested_ you are in it!” 

Laura just laughed, and Carmilla shrugged before pressing a few buttons, untangling herself from Laura, and putting the phone on the coffee table. She leaned back onto the sofa and Laura was quick to wrap her arms around her again. 

“Hey, Carm, what’s up? Do you need me to come get you? I have a lot of ice cream and I even got that soy milk you like-“

“No, no, LaF it’s fine!” Carmilla interrupted, face going red. Laura had to stifle a laugh at the image of Carmilla eating Ben & Jerry’s after a heartbreak. “It went well. More than well!” 

“Oh, that’s great! Why are you calling me then?” 

“Laura wanted me to.”

“Hi!” Laura waved, before realising that she couldn’t be seen over the phone. She slowly put her hand down and this time it was Carmilla’s turn to laugh. 

“Oh, hey! Way to tell a guy they’re on speaker, dude!” 

“Sorry, you didn’t give me the chance. In my defence I’m pretty sure _I_ got embarrassed more than you right there,” Carmilla said. 

“Fair enough. So why are you calling me again?” 

“I wanted to say thank you!” Laura spoke up. “For everything. If it wasn’t for you, Carmilla would still be thinking Danny was a guy and I was straight.” 

“I thought we could get past that,” Carmilla grumbled. 

“And thanks for the flowers! They’re lovely!”

“No problem,” Laura could hear the pride in LaFontaine’s voice from over the phone. 

“No, seriously, they’re great. If only we’d had these back when you had the shop, right? I would have bought like a bucketload of them!”

Suddenly, Carmilla bolted upwards. “Laura! You’re a genius!”

“I am?” 

“LaF, you can sell those flowers! That’s the niche market the florists was missing!” 

“Holy crap, you’re right!” LaF said, “I’ve gotta call up my mom, see if she can form another business plan. I mean technically I could operate as a sole trader, but that gives me limited liability from the bank and considering how well it all turned out _last_ time…” 

They went off on a tangent, and Laura stopped listening. She was just enjoying the feeling of having done something right, finally. 

And she was only half talking about the flowers. The other half was focused on the girl curled up next to her. 

 


	15. Epilogue

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> hollstein are gross what's new
> 
> [THIS IS THE EPILOGUE MEANING THAT THIS FANFIC IS OFFICIALLY OVER!!!! SO THANK YOU SO SO MUCH FOR EVERYONE WHO'S READ IT AND LEFT KUDOS OR COMMENTS LIKE REALLY   
> I STARTED THIS FANFIC WITH LIKE ZERO PLAN AND NOW IT WAS FEATURED ON AUTOSTRADDLE AND IT'S THE FOURTH MOST KUDOS-ED FIC ON AO3 LIKE ????? THANK YOU ?????]

The chimes at the door rang, and Carmilla didn’t look up from her book. There had been so many customers, she couldn’t greet all of them. Business had really been booming. Who knew so many people were allergic to flowers? 

“Um, excuse me?” a voice said. Carmilla’s head snapped up. 

“Laura? What are you doing here?” 

“Well, I wanted to buy some flowers. That is what you do here, right…” Laura squinted at Carmilla’s name tag, “…Carmilla?”

Carmilla played along. “Of course! I’m here to answer any questions you may have.” 

“Well, I was wondering what flowers I should get if I were to be going on a date tonight?” 

“Depends. This date, what is it?” 

“I was thinking a picnic under the stars,” Laura said, leaning on the countertop. 

“Well, whoever they are they’re very lucky. And _super_ attractive I bet.” 

“Meh, they’re alright,” Laura said, barely concealing her laughter. 

“Okay, offended!” 

“Shut up you know I’m kidding! Anyway, aside from the date thing, I have something great to tell you!” Laura bounced up and down. 

“What is it?” 

“I came out to my dad!” 

“Holy shit!” Carmilla grinned, moving from behind the counter to envelope her girlfriend in a big hug. “How did it go?” 

“Really awesome! I was like ‘hey, Dad, I’m dating a florist!’ and he was like, ‘a florist? Are you sure he’s not gay?’ so then _I_ was like, ‘actually, yeah, she is gay!’ and his face was _priceless_ and long story short you’re invited to my dad’s house for dinner on Sunday.” 

“Wow. I’m really glad it went well, Cupcake. _And_ I’ll be sure to wear my Sunday best!” 

“Don’t worry about it, Carm, he’s going to love you even if you turn up in sweatpants!” 

“Is that an invitation for me to turn up in sweatpants?” 

“Okay so _maybe_ wear something more presentable! But seriously, don’t dress up or anything. You look great in whatever you wear.” 

“I look forward to it.”

* * *

 

 _I don’t know what LaF was talking about_ Carmilla thought as she watered the cactus. The amount of small cuts on her hand from the prickles made it obvious that this was about the least relaxing thing ever. 

Still, LaF had said it could be therapeutic, plus there was no one in the shop but her. They had gone out to buy some more flower pots, and the shop was empty for the first time today. 

Sighing, she set down the watering can. 

“I can’t believe I’m doing this,” she said, sitting down cross legged on the floor. “Okay, hi, Kevin.” 

She felt ridiculous talking to the inanimate cactus. Still, she’d been feeling ridiculous a lot recently. Dating Laura Hollis tended to have that affect on a person.

“So… uh… there’s this girl, Laura. Actually you probably remember her, she was here when you got delivered- wait what am I talking about you’re a plant of course you don’t remember her… anyway, um, so I know I promised myself that I’d never let anyone else get close to me since Elle and trust me okay I tried but _damn_ does this girl never give up. And she heard about everything that happened and she hugged me okay? She fucking hugged me. After everything that I did she didn’t condemn me or run for the hills she just…” 

Carmilla took a deep breath, steadying herself. 

“Do you know how rare that is? To find someone who knows you’re not perfect and still cares about you? With everyone else I’ve been lying about something, or pretending to be something but not with her. With her I’m myself and she still…” she shook her head, laughing slightly, “she still sticks around. I can’t believe how lucky I am. And we’ve been dating and I’m being invited to her _dad’s house for dinner_ and this is the first time I’ll ever meet the parents of someone I’m dating and have them _know_ we’re dating. And I’d be lying if I said it didn’t scare the shit out of me. But if her dad’s anything like her, I know it’ll be okay because she’s the most forgiving and accepting person I know. And I’m so glad I finally did something right. I fell in love with Laura Hollis.”

“Carmilla?” 

Sighing, she banged her head against Kevin’s pot. “Can we please pretend you didn’t just hear me say that?”

“You’re in love with me?” 

Carmilla stood up and turned to face Laura, whose eyes were wide and whose mouth was hanging slightly open. 

“Uh, _duh._ It’s been like two and a half years, I figured you knew.” 

“Well, yeah but… you’ve never said it before.” 

“Oh, I have,” Carmilla said, “it’s just that usually when I’m talking to inanimate objects, you’re not around to hear me.” 

Laura smiled unbelievably wide, and said, “I love you too.” 

And Carmilla felt like her heart was soaring. 

 

**Author's Note:**

> carmilluminati.tumblr.com  
> track the tag #carmilla florist fic for updates/me crying about it probably


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